Total Drama: Genesis of the Island
by Captain Skips
Summary: 1 Island. 2 Hosts. 24 teens. All coming together for 8 weeks of hell none of them will ever forget, barring cases of concussion-induced amnesia. Now, join new arrivals Adam and Shannon, and the 22 other campers you know and love/hate/both of those things, for the Genesis of the greatest reality show the world will ever know.
1. Introduction to Destruction

**THE FOLLOWING IS A NONPROFIT FAN-BASED WORK OF FICTION  
****THE TOTAL DRAMA FRANCHISE IS OWNED BY FRESH TV, TELETOON, JENNIFER PERTSCH AND TOM MCGILLIS  
****PLEASE SUPPORT THE OFFICIAL RELEASE**

**Content Warning: **Contains some foul language, largely thanks to Shannon

* * *

The sunlight glistening off the lake, combined with the precise camera angle that left the rather nice-looking cliffs in shot, while also cutting off the junk infested beach to the right and the bear eating an albatross to the left managed to give this particular corner of Canadian-flavoured hell a fairly convincing disguise of 'hey, maybe this isn't so bad'. Those illusions were cracked when a man popped into frame out of seemingly nowhere. He was somewhat handsome, the feature that marred his face the most being his unnaturally small beady eyes. His hair was black, and contained enough product to render the result of 6 hours of post-production nigh-useless in diminishing its artificial shine.

The illusion of safety cracked even further with his introductory line of "Yo!". Those two words, laced with an ungodly amount of ego, betrayed exactly what type of reality show this was going to be. It was gonna be one of those shows. The one with the host whose more interested in himself than anything to do with the contestants, the one where half of said contestants are complete idiots, a quarter are evil, an eighth are just plain weird, half of those remaining are some combination of the above categories, and the sliver that remains (a whole sixteenth of the contestants, for those mathematically inclined. Which in a cast of 24, gives us one and a half contestants) could be considered somewhat normal. The host continued on his big introductory ramble.

"We're coming at you live from Camp Wawanakwa, somewhere in Muskoka, Ontario" this was a lie. By the time the first broadcast hit the airwaves, the show had been over for three weeks, and a winner already declared. Several news outlets had purportedly leaked the winner, but no-one believed any of them due to the fact that of the 17 major showbiz tabloid publications in Canada, 12 of them got different contestants, and none of them were correct.

"I'm your host, Chris Maclean" as Chris said his own name, the amount of ego in the air around Muskoka became so thick as to register on weather satellites "Dropping season 1 of the hottest new reality show on television, right now!"

There was a needlessly brief drumroll, and the cutaway to Chris walking down a completely different dock gave away his previous statement that the show was live as the lie it was.

"Here's the deal:" he said as he walked down the dock "24 campers have signed up to spend 8 weeks right here at this crummy old summer camp" At this he paused in his wandering

"They'll compete in challenges against each other, then, have to face the judgement of their fellow campers" The camera zoomed in suddenly on Chris's face, almost going to fast and hitting him with the lens. To his credit, he didn't flinch, and continued his monologue as if nothing happened.

"Every 3 days, 1 team will either win a reward, or watch one of their team members walk down the Dock of Shame, take a ride on the Loser Boat" he stopped briefly to chuckle at his own joke "and leave Total Drama Island for good"

Another cut, continuing to tear to pieces the illusion of live television (or the myth that teleportation is impossible), saw Chris suddenly burst into view on a rock overlooking a campfire pit, complete with 12 'seats' that looked more like lumps of rotting wood arranged in 2 rows.

"Their fate will be decided here, at the dramatic Campfire Ceremonies, where each week, all but one camper will receive a marshmallow" during this sentence, Chris demonstrated once again his miraculous ability to teleport by disappearing from the rock face and walking into the campfire area from the gate on the opposite side. As he said the word 'marshmallow' he grabbed one of the hyper-concentrated balls of sugar and ate one, before tossing the stick it was skewered on away. The faint sound of someone being hit in the head and a cry of "HEY!" would be edited out.

"In the end, only one will be left standing, and will be rewarded with cheesy tabloid fame, and a small fortune which, let's face it, they'll probably blow in a week" throughout this explanation, Chris continued to defy the laws of physics, first by producing a set of tabloid magazines with his face on it, and a treasure chest loaded with gold and jewels, both from seemingly nowhere; a place to which they disappeared just as fast

"To survive, they'll have to battle black flies" cut to a swarm of flies "grizzly bears" pan down to an angry grizzly bear swatting at the flies "disgusting camp food" cut to an overgrown maggot with a face and moustache, who greeted the camera with a "Hey now"

"And, each other" Chris went on as the camera cut back to him at the dock "Every moment will be caught on one of the hundreds of cameras situated all over the camp" the shot cut to first a camera in a bird nest about to have worm regurgitated onto it, then to a camera haphazardly duct-taped to a totem pole. It then cut back to Chris, who was making excessively dramatic poses like some sort of anime character.

"Who will crumble under the pressure? Find out here, right now on Total. Drama. Island!"

In the TV edit, at this point a title card would fly into place when Chris finished his dramatic intro. In reality, Chris just moved about on the dock a bit

* * *

As the title card literally fell off the screen, the show cut back to Chris on the dock

"Welcome back to Total Drama Island!" he said with flourish "Alright, it's time to meet our first 12 campers. We told them they'd all be staying at this five-star resort, so if they seem a little TO-ed, that's probably why" there was a vaguely malicious glint in his eye as he added this last part.

On cue, a boat pulled up to the island, and dropped of the first contestant. It was a fairly short girl, with brown hair tied up in a high ponytail. She had on a thick pair of glasses, and was clad mostly in green, though sported a pair of bright pink pants that miraculously didn't clash as much as one might think

"Beth! What's up?" Chris greeted her. Beth's response was to run up and deliver a flying hug to the host

"It'sth stho incredulousth to meet you!" she exclaimed, before dropping off the slightly weirded out Chris and adding "wow, you're much sthorter in real life." Those brief sentences revealed her most distinctive trait, the thick braces that saw a gallon of spit fly out her mouth with each sentence and left her with an incredibly noticeable lisp. Evidently confused, Chris could only respond with "uh, thanks" while Beth began waving to the camera.

As if sensing the increase in awkwardness around the dock, the boat (or maybe a different one) came back, and dropped off the second contestant. And this one was pretty much the exact opposite of Beth. He was African-Canadian, sported a fairly nice-looking chin beard, and in contrast to Beth's diminutive stature, he was both incredibly tall and incredibly well built. He was wearing a white skull cap, a green t-shirt with the letter 'D' printed on the front, and grey shorts.

Chris greeted the man-mountain with a simple "DJ!", which was presumably the giant's name.

"Yo! Chris Maclean!" DJ began as the two hi-fived "How's it going" he then paused to examine his surroundings "Hey, you sure you got the right place here? Where's the hot tub at?"

"Yo dawg, this is it: Camp Wawanakwa!" Chris replied, sounding even more insufferably smug than usual. DJ shrugged, picked up his bags, and wandered off to join Beth at the end of the dock

"Looked a lot different on the application form" he mumbled to himself as he went.

Out of literally nowhere, a new contestant appeared, this one a girl with pale skin, dark clothing and hair that alternated between black, dark teal and a lighter teal.

"Hey Gwen" Chris greeted the new arrival. She stalked over to him, the look in her eyes betraying a vaguely murderous desire. Eh, goths, go figure.

"You mean we're staying _here_?" she asked, with the word 'here' coming off with the same tone as one might say 'a dumpster', or 'the morgue', or 'Swindon'.

"No" Chris began, still smug as ever "_You're_ staying here. My crib is an airstream with AC thataway" he said, pointing to somewhere vaguely behind him. The vague murderous desire in Gwen's eyes became more defined as Chris went on

"I did not sign up for this" she snapped, looking perfectly willing to strangle her host. Chris only smirked at her

"Actually, you did" he pulled out a large pile of papers (from seemingly nowhere, mind you) with the word 'CONTRACT' written at the top in blood red lettering. Gwen ripped the papers out of Chris's hand and, in a shocking display of strength, ripped the entire thing in two and dropped the pieces in the water with a satisfied smirk. Chris remained unfazed, however.

"The great thing about lawyers is, they make lots of copies" with an evil glint in his eyes, Chris pulled out another bundle of papers from nowhere, continuing his trend of routinely violating the laws of physics. Gwen simply picked up her bags and turned around

"I am not staying here"

"Cool" said Chris "I hope you can swim though, because your ride just left" he gestured to the departing boat

"Jerk!" Gwen spat as the stomped off to join the others.

The next boat arrived not long after, and there was a resounding 'THUD' as its occupant tripped on his way out and faceplanted on the dock with a pathetic sounding 'ow'. In his fall, he managed to toss one of his cases up in the air, and it landed on the back of his head with a smaller thud and an even more pathetic 'ow'. The boat departed as contestant 4 staggered to his feet, revealing a short, very thin boy wearing a bright white hoodie, grey skinny jeans that just looked like normal jeans on him, and on his head was a blue bucket hat and horn-rimmed glasses

"Adam! How ya doing little guy?" Chris greeted as Adam nervously walked over, clutching a notebook to his chest

"Oh, u-uh, okay, I guess" he stuttered out, the nervousness in his voice coating every word like icing on a cake. His voice was pretty high-pitched, almost prepubescent in tone, though a lot of that could have been attributed to nerves

"You sure dude? You look like you're gonna faint" Chris continued in his usual vaguely mocking tone

"N-no, I'm fine" he replied as he trudged timidly over to the other contestants, making sure to stand as far away from them as possible. When he got to the dock, he opened up the notebook, took a pencil out from one of his pockets, and began to jot things down, occasionally looking at his host or fellow contestants, and immediately looking away when they looked at him.

As he was doing this, the sound of loud party music could be heard rapidly approaching as the fifth boat drew near. Atop said boat was a guy with blond hair largely hidden by a cowboy hat, and a pick button-up shirt that was completely unbuttoned, revealing a fairly muscular chest. He leapt from the boat, did a flip, landing in a handstand on the safety rail, then flipped off of that and stuck the landing on the dock. Someone on the boat tossed him his suitcase, and it landed next to the guy as he gave a thumbs up.

"Chris Maclean!" he practically yelled as he walked up to the dock. They fistbumped, and the guy continued "'Sup man, it's an honour to meet you man" Chris responded with finger guns

"The Geoffster! Welcome to the Island man"

"Thanks man"

"If they say 'man' one more time, I'm gonna puke" cut in Gwen from the end of the dock. Geoff and Chris hi-fived as the sound of an outboard motor indicated the arrival of contestant 6.

"Everybody; this is Lindsay" Chris gestured to a blonde girl with cowboy boots, a miniskirt and crop top, a blue bandana and the largest set of tits this side of the Atlantic. "Not too shabby" Chris stage whispered to the camera

"Hiii~" Lindsay sing-songed. She looked at Chris with confusion for a moment "Okay, you look so familiar"

"I'm Chris Maclean" said Chris, as if expecting applause. Lindsay merely stared at him blankly. "The host of the show" he added, with confusion

"Oh, that's where I know you from." From the end of the dock, Gwen pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed heavily

"Uh, yeah" was all Chris had to say as another boat (or was it the same one?) pulled up at the dock. Out from the boat stepped a tall girl of possible Asian descent, with long black hair, a pair of sunglasses, a crop top somehow even shorter than Lindsay's and a pair of extremely short shorts. As she stepped off the boat, she lowered her sunglasses to glare at her fellow competitors, prompting a roll of the eyes from Gwen, nervous looks from DJ and Lindsay, and a faint 'eep' from Adam

"Heather" Chris greeted. Heather ignored him, and strolled past the host to stand with the other contestants. Before she could reach the dock, however, she was approached by Beth with an enthusiastic "Hi! Lookth like we're your new friendth for the next eight weekth!" Every word of that sentence was accompanied by a litre of spittle, prompting Heather to back away, disgusted.

The live demonstration of the effect of orthodontic treatment on the process of expectorating was cut off by the sound of loud guitars coming from the next boat. On the prow was clearly a juvenile delinquent, complete with black skull shirt, a spiked collar, a green mohawk, and enough facial piercings to set off every metal detector in a half-mile radius. He jumped off the boat and glared at Chris

"Duncan, dude!" Chris greeted.

"I don't like surprises" Duncan threatened as he balled his fist. Chris, however, remained unfazed in the face of such impending violence.

"Yeah your parole officer warned me about that man. He also told me to give him a holler any time and have you return to juvie." At the mention of the word juvie, another 'eep' could be heard from the end of the dock, once again from Adam. Duncan just snorted, and walked off to the end of the dock

"Meet you by the campfire gorgeous" he leered at Heather as he walked past

"Drop dead you skeeze" was her response. She then proceeded to stalk over to the large pile of cases that had accumulated, complaining all the way.

"I'm calling my parents, you cannot make me stay here" Chris just grinned and pulled out the contract again.

The horn of a boat sounded, and the boat it belonged to came speeding into view, pulling behind it a boy clad in a red tracksuit and red bandana on water-skis

"Ladies and gentlemen, Tyler!" Chris proclaimed. Tyler waved, but quickly lost his balance, fell off his skis, and began skimming across the water, before flying off the dock and landing in the pile of cases, scattering them about the place. One of the stray cases hit Adam in the face, and he was knocked back into the water. The splash from Adam's impact ended up getting Heather soaking wet as well, and she began complaining about her shoes

"Wicked wipeout man!" called Chris. Tyler's fist emerged from the pile of cases, and quickly morphed into a thumbs up. Geoff and DJ gave each other thumbs up, Gwen just rolled her eyes, and Adam struggled to pull himself up from the dock, his bucket hat now obscuring his vision. Chris began giggling at Heather's misfortune, until he was interrupted by a long sigh. He turned around to see a lanky ginger with glasses, a blue shirt and a few hairs on his chin that barely passed as a beard

"Welcome to Camp, Harold." Harold just looked around

"What'th he looking at?" Asked Beth, providing voice to most of the campers' thoughts. Except Heather, who was wringing out her hair and glaring at Adam, Lindsay, who was transfixed by a passing butterfly, and Adam, who was wringing out his hat and cowering away from Heather's glare.

"So you mean this show is at a crappy summer camp and not on some big stage or something?" Harold eventually asked

"You got it!"

"Yes!" came the response from Harold as he fist-pumped "That is so much more favourable to my skills" Chris shuddered as Harold walked past.

"Contestant number 12 is Trent" Chris announced as the next contestant walked up, trying desperately to move on as quickly as possible. He was a fairly tall guy with black hair, a green shirt with a hand on it, and was carrying a guitar case.

"Hey, good to meet you, man" Trent greeted Chris "Saw you on that figure skating show, nice work" Chris and Trent fist bumped

"Hey thanks man, I knew I rocked that show!" For the first time, a note of an emotion that wasn't smug satisfaction or concealed anticipation entered Chris's voice, instead it was genuine pride

"I thaw that" cut in Beth "One of the guyth dropped hith partner on her head! Though they got immunity that week"

"Lucky" added Harold "I hope I get dropped on my head"

"Me too" said Lindsay, who was far too excited about the prospect of cranial trauma.

"I could've sworn he's the one who dropped his partner" Adam mumbled to himself mostly. But regardless of intended audience, that comment produced angry glares from both Heather and Chris, and Adam quickly shut up with a whimper.

"So, this is it" Trent asked, steering the conversation back to its original topic. He looked at the assembled group of misfits, from Heather still wringing out her hair and glaring at Adam, to Gwen's look of total boredom, to Harold, who had just stuck his finger in his nose

"Alrighty then" he stepped forward into the crowd, and wound up next to Gwen. He smiled at her, and she turned her head away in a huff, but couldn't stop the small smile that formed on her face.

The next boat to arrive had a girl with a surfboard on it. She had her blonde hair in a ponytail, and was wearing a blue hoodie and denim shorts, and rounded off the look with what appeared to be flip-flops, the most practical of footwear.

"Hey, what's up?" the girl asked Chris as she stepped down from the boat

"Alright! Our surfer chick, Bridgette, is here!" Chris delivered with his usual false enthusiasm. From the ever-growing crowd, Duncan snorted

"Nice board; this ain't Malibu, honey"

"I thought we were gonna be on a beach" was Bridgette's response

"We are!" cut in Chris proudly, gesturing to a beach covered in junk, including a seagull with one of the things that binds six-packs of beer together round its neck. A wave then carried the seemingly immobile seagull off into the water. Bridgette just sighed, and muttered "Great"

"Alright, that makes-" Chris was cut off from his announcement by Bridgette leaning down to pick up her stuff, resulting in her whacking Chris on the head with her surfboard

"Ow!" he rubbed his head "Darn it, that hurt!" Bridgette ignored him, and walked over to the other campers, greeting them with a "Hey guys."

It was Geoff who responded to her first "Hey, I'm Geoff." He walked around to the other side of her. Bridgette turned to face the party dude, and as a result her board swung around, causing all the campers to have to duck. Well, all except Tyler, who had stopped paying attention and was knocked into the water with a faint "Oof!". No-one paid attention to Tyler as Harold piped up

"Hey, watch the board man." No-one paid Harold any attention either

"Hi! I'm Beth" said Beth (duh) from the other side of Bridgette. She turned again, this time sending Adam flying into the water. This time, however, people paid attention to Adam, likely due to the loud cry of "BWAUGH" he let out as he fell into the water for the second time that day.

"Oh my god, are you okay?!" exclaimed the surfer girl as she dashed over to where Adam had taken the plunge and began fishing for him. A few seconds after falling in, he surfaced, spitting out more lake water, and Bridgette grabbed him by the arm and pulled him onto the dock.

"I think I swallowed a fish" came the now hoarse voice of Adam in between coughs as Bridgette continued to fret over him. He began coughing again, and sure enough a small fish eventually emerged from the Wallflower's lungs, flopped around on the deck for a few seconds before slapping both Adam and Bridgette in the face with its tail and jumping back into the water. Meanwhile, a certain Queen Bee had finished wringing out her hair and was becoming impatient

"Great job surfer girl, is there anyone else you want to bludgeon or can we get on with the show now?"

"Someone missed their double cappuccino macchiato this morning" came the sneering voice of Duncan from the other side of the crowd

"Get bent"

While this discussion was happening, another boat had come around to the dock and dropped off the next contestant, an Indian boy with brown hair and a red sweater vest

"Our next contestant is Noah!" Chris proclaimed with markedly less enthusiasm, still rubbing his head.

"Did you get my memo about my life-threatening allergies?" Was Noah's attempt at a greeting

Chris was now back to his normal false-cheery self "I'm sure someone did"

"Good, is this where we're staying?" Noah asked as he walked over to the other campers

"No, this is your mother's house, and we're throwing a party" cut in Duncan yet again, cracking his knuckles

"Cute, nice piercings original, do them yourself?" was Noah's response. Duncan then proceeded to grab him by the lip and stretch it far beyond normal human capacity

"Yeah, you want one" Noah just sighed

"No thanks, can I have my lip back please?" Duncan obliged, and Noah responded with an incredibly deadpan "Thanks."

Noah went off to stand beside Adam, who had gotten up and was wringing out his hat again, as the next camper arrived to the sound of a rap beat

"Wassup y'all, Leshawna's in the house" came a call from a… uh, large black girl with hoop earrings and her hair in a weave. Harold let out a gasp at the sight of her, for some reason.

"Yo baby, hey how ya doin, how's it goin?" She asked rapid fire as she walked past Chris, giving him a hi-five along the way "Feel free to quit now and save yo'selves the trouble cause, I came to win"

She arrived at DJ "Oh wassup my brother?" she hi-fived him as well "gimme some sugar baby!"

It was then that Harold popped into frame, standing apparently on air

"I've never seen a girl like you in real life before."

"Excuse me?" Leshawna replied with a playful smirk. Harold stopped levitating and came back to the dock to reply

"You're real big. And loud" Leshawna's face immediately shifted into an expression of anger

"**What** did you say to me? Oh no you didn't!" the other campers sensed immediate incoming violence and either backed away, or rushed to hold the sister back as she continued her rant "You have not seen anything yet, I'll show you big, baby" She was about to pounce on Harold when DJ and Bridgette managed to hold her back, while Harold struck a series of martial arts poses

"Oh yeah, you want some o' this, well **c'mon** then!" Leshawna kept yelling as she struggled against the two holding her back

"Alright campers, settle down" Chris was actually being responsible, for the first and last time. Leshawna glared at Harold, while Harold gave an innocent smile and backed away a few paces. Meanwhile, two new campers had arrived

"Ladies, Katie, Sadie, welcome to you new home for 8 weeks!" Chris greeted the two girls. They were dressed identically, both wearing a zebra stripe tube top and pink short shorts. Physically, Katie was the taller, thinner and more tan one, while Sadie was shorter, paler, and er… bigger. Despite their dismal surroundings the two seemed ecstatic to be there

"Ohmygosh, Sadie look, it's a summer camp!" Katie said far too cheerfully

"Okay, I always wanted to go to summer camp" said Sadie, somehow sounding even more cheerful. The two girls then let out an incredibly high-pitched "EEEE!" that left most of the campers holding their ears in pain.

No sooner had the wonder twins dashed off to be with the other campers than the next camper arrived, a boy with brown hair wearing a green hoodie and a toque.

"Ezekiel! What's up man?" Ezekiel looked up and pointed to the sky

"I think I see a bird" came the response in a thick Canadian accent. Several campers snickered at this.

"Okay, look dude, I know you don't get out much." Chris said as he put his hand on Ezekiel's shoulder "Been home schooled your whole life, raised by freaky prairie people. Just don't say much and try not to get kicked off to early, okay?"

"Yes sir" said Ezekiel with a salute as he walked off to join his campmates

"That's just… wow" was Gwen's reaction. But before anyone else could make disparaging comments about Ezekiel, the next camper arrived, a short boy with chestnut hair and a noticeable gap in his teeth

"Cody! The Code-ster! The Codemeister!" Chris greeted, the sarcasm in his voice lost on the new arrival; the two hi-fived, and Cody walked off with an overcompensating swagger in his step

"Dude, psyched to be here man" he came up to Bridgette, Lindsay and Leshawna "I see the ladies have already arrived, alright" the overcompensating swagger in his step was somehow over-overcompensated by the swagger in his voice. He walked past, but then quickly doubled back to say something to Leshawna. She cut him off quickly with a finger on his lips and a "Save it, short stuff." He got the hint, and dashed off to stand by Adam at the end of the dock. As he did so, the next camper arrived. It was an incredibly muscular looking girl clad in blue gym gear, with black hair in a ponytail, and a unibrow.

"Eva. Nice. Glad you could make it" Chris gave off no signs of fear as Eva stomped past without a word. She ended up next to Cody, who held up his hand for a hi-five. She left him hanging, and instead dropped her bag on his foot. He leapt back with a yelp, clutching his foot and hopping on the other foot for a bit.

"What's in there, dumbbells?" he asked when the pain died down enough to enable speech. Eva glared at him and simply replied "Yes". At this, Duncan nudged DJ and stage whispered "She's all yours man" Eva heard, and shot a much fiercer glare at Duncan.

The boat came around again, but this time nobody paid it much attention, as they were too busy trying to slowly back away from Eva. They did, however, pay attention to the loud cry of "WOO-HOO" that came from the contestant that dropped off the boat. It was a guy so large he put DJ to shame, but where DJ was large through muscles, this guy was large through excessive eating. He was blonde, and was wearing a football shirt with a maple leaf on the front and the number '0' on the back

"Chris! What's happening?" The giant practically yelled. He broke down in giggles, then composed himself just as quickly "This is awesome! WOO HOO!" Clearly, this contestant did not have an indoor voice.

"Owen! Welcome!" Chris yelled back, but his volume paled in comparison to Owen's. Owen gave the host a hug that was accompanied by the sound of something breaking.

"Awesome to be here man! Yeah!" Chris had finally dropped his smile, and was instead in clear pain. Owen paid it no attention "Man, this is so..." he lost his train of thought for a moment

"Awesome?" suggested Gwen from the dock

"Yes!" He yelled back at her "Awesome! WOOOOO! Hey, are you gonna be on my team"

"Oh I sure hope so" The sarcasm dripping from every syllable of Gwen's sentence flew straight over Owen's head (an impressive feat given his height), and he let out yet another "WOOOO"

"You about finished?" came Chris, apparently no longer in pain. Owen put him down

"Sorry dude, I'm just so psyched!" Before Owen could let out another yell or hug/crush someone else, the sound of bagpipes could be heard from the approaching boat. Stood on top of the railings on the prow was a girl trying her best to keep her balance on the moving boat. The most distinctive part of her was her hair, which reached as far as her chin at its longest point, and appeared to have been brutally attacked by a series of visually-impaired barbers armed with blunt scissors, as the bottom had been cut in a wildly inconsistent zigzag pattern. The biggest zig was the hair in front of her face, which zagged down into a fringe that covered the entire left side of her face including her left eye; her one visible eye was blue. She wore a leather jacket, beneath which was a shirt with _The Clash_ printed across the chest; on her legs were ripped jeans that looked as though the rips were unintentional, and her shoes were plain black trainers.

As the boat pulled into the dock, the bagpipes stopped and she hopped off the prow, swaying a bit on the landing. As she righted herself, her suitcase was thrown from the boat, which she deftly caught as she turned and waved to the crowd. And it was as she opened her mouth that the major malfunction of this contestant was revealed:

"Aye howzitgoan' a'body?" she happily declared to the confused stares of her fellow contestants. Yes, if the bagpipes weren't a big enough giveaway, Shannon was Scottish, and had the thickest accent ever heard outside of Edinburgh.

"Is thhe thpeaking Englith?" asked Beth to no-one in particular. She was met with naught but confused shrugs.

"Shannon. Uh, hi" even Chris was stumped

"Chris Maclean, ya wee bastart!" she cheerily yelled as she slapped Chris on the back, apparently a bit too hard, as he almost fell over with the impact. He staggered back upright as Shannon was looking around "Aye, ye didnae fuckin tell me we were gointae be in this shitehole". Chris took a moment to compose himself from the consecutive back injuries, and then gave Shannon an actual response

"Okay, first of all, watch the language, censors cost money, second of all, surprise! Welcome to your new home for up to 8 weeks!". Shannon raised her one visible eyebrow at the host, then sighed and walked off, grumbling to herself all the way

"Oh sure Shannon, sign up fer the show on th' telly, it'll be _fun_." she looked around again and shrugged "Ah well, it still beats a summer wi' Angus."

"Okay, does anyone have any idea what she's saying?" apparently, Gwen was fed up with having a contestant no-one could understand. No-one had any idea, so Gwen just sighed and Shannon entered the crowd, trying to strike up conversations with people, but such attempts were thwarted by her incomprehensible accent an vocabulary that sounded like it was 50% made-up words.

"Anyway, here comes Courtney." Called Chris, evidently try to bring the show back on the rails. Courtney was a tanned girl, or maybe Hispanic, with brown hair and a grey t-shirt on over a white shirt. She was stood at the prow of her boat, waving cheerily to people

"Thank you" she said to Chris as he helped her down from the boat. She walked over to the now pretty large crowd

"Hi! You must be the other contestants, it's really nice to meet you all." Owen immediately leapt forward to greet her.

"How's it going? I'm Owen" he said while enthusiastically shaking her hand for far too long

"Nice to meet you Ohhhhhhhhh wow" Courtney trailed off as she saw the next contestant to arrive. It was a Hawaiian guy, with black hair containing almost as much product as Chris, and a physique that screamed 'male model'. Almost every girl in the crowd, and also Owen, stared at him with unmasked adoration. He flashed a smile to the camera on the boat, and some of the contestants could swear they saw his teeth glint in the sunlight. As he stepped off the boat, Sadie fainted, and Eva started drooling.

"This is Justin" announced Chris "Welcome to Total Drama Island." He and Justin fist bumped.

"Thanks Chris, this is great" came the reply from the beauteous god of a man. (Or so I've been told he is that. I like girls. Shut up).

"Just so you know, we picked you entirely based on your looks" Justin shrugged

"I can deal with that." It was then that Owen ran up

"I like your pants" he exclaimed

"Thanks man" apparently such a comment did not weird Justin out. Maybe he was used to it. That or he was just good at hiding it

"'Cause they look like they're all worn out" Owen chuckled "Did you buy them like that?"

"Uh, no, just had them for a while"

"Oh. Cool!" Owen then smacked himself in the head "Stupid!" Justin took his place in the crowd, Beth and Katie, the latter dragging the unconscious Sadie, both immediately rushing to stand by him.

"Hey everyone, Izzy" Chris called, trying to drag the camper's attention away from Justin and onto the final contestant to arrive.

"Hi Chris! Hi everyone! Hi!" called Izzy as she ran across the boat. She was a redhead girl clad in a green crop top with a bizarrely placed opening right between the chesticles, and green short shorts and a wraparound her waist. She managed to yell out one last "Hi!" before she tripped over the railing at the front off the boat and feel out, bashing her jaw on the dock as she fell into the water

"Oooh, that was bad" cut in Tyler for the first time, Meanwhile, Courtney ran up to the end of the dock where Izzy fell in

"Guys, she could be seriously hurt" she began as she pulled Izzy out the water, who for some reason had a manic grin on her face. Izzy shook her hair dry like a dog

"That felt… so… good!" she exclaimed as she stood up "Except for hitting my chin. Is this summer camp? That is so cool! Do you have papier-mâché here? Are we having lunch soon?" she asked at a million miles per hour

"That is a good call!" yelled Owen, unsurprisingly

"First things first" proclaimed Chris dramatically "We need a group photo for the promos. Everyone on the end of the dock!" The group obliged, some grudgingly, and Chris performed a near superhuman leap onto the boat, having pulled a camera out of nowhere.

"Okay!" Chris called, setting up the camera "One! Two! Three" The group posed and waited for the flash. But it did not come

"Oops" the campers' faces fell "Forgot the lens cap. Okay, hold that pose! One! Two!" the campers' faces fell yet again as Chris stopped his picture taking for the second time

"Oh. No wait. Card's full. Hang on."

"C'mon man, my face is startin to freeze" yelled Leshawna

"Got it! Okay, everyone say, 'Wawanakwa!'" The campers obliged, and as they did, the dock collapsed underneath them, sending them plunging into the water. Several sounds could be heard from the group, most of which were screaming, but the ones that weren't were a fed up "not again" from Adam, joyful whooping from Izzy, a cry of "Oh you son of a bi-" from Gwen, and a massive tirade of curse words, half of which were seemingly made up, from Shannon.

"Okay guys, dry off and meet at the campfire pit in 10"

A cluster of bubbles began to rise to the surface of the lake, eventually arranging themselves in the shape of the work "Fuck". A few seconds after it formed, Shannon emerged from the lake in the same spot, and one by one the rest of the campers reared their heads, Gwen apparently having not stopped ranting about the horrific tortures she was going to inflict on Chris. Evidently, goths do not like impromptu swimming trips.

The group waded into the shallows and stood up in the knee-deep water, none of them looking particularly good for their trip into the lake. Well, Justin looked good but that's pretty much a fact of life (I still like girls). Gwen's makeup was running, making her look like she came straight out of some obscure Asian horror movie; Tyler's headband kept falling in front of his eyes and making him run into things, Shannon's hair now covered both eyes rather than just one, Leshawna's weave had somehow turned into an afro, and Adam was coughing up another fish.

* * *

For 23 of the campers, the fall into the lake was little more than the first in a very long line of misfortunes brought upon them by their host. For a certain tech geek however, the fall into the lake and the subsequent trudge onto the shore turned into one of the defining moments of his life.

For it was during this trudge, as Cody finally made it onto the shore and looked back onto the lake to see if there were any campers behind him, that something caught his eye. It wasn't the scary looking punk muttering what were likely threats on Chris Maclean's life that drew his gaze, nor was it the pink-shirted party boy's frantic search in the water for his cowboy hat. No, what caught his eye was the sight of the goth girl, whose name he never caught, angrily marching out of the lake with a fierce scowl on her face, ranting to the sky about the incredibly violent things she wanted to do to their host. For whatever reason, Cody was transfixed. And in a fact that would surprise him were he aware enough to detect it, he wasn't transfixed by the fact the hot goth girl's top was soaking wet and practically transparent. In fact, were he to look back on the moment, Cody wouldn't be able to pinpoint what it was that drew his attention. It could have been the way the wet strands of the girl's dyed hair framed her face; it could also have been the fire he saw in her dark eyes as she threatened to removed from Chris Maclean body parts he didn't know existed. But, whatever the reason, her hair or her eyes, the effect on Cody was the same, even though he wouldn't know quite what had happened for a few days.

But regardless of his present awareness (or lack thereof), in that moment Cody Anderson fell in love

* * *

After everyone had dried off, Cody had shaken off his Gwen-induced stupor enough to use his higher brain functions, and several girls (and Owen) had gotten over seeing Justin shirtless, the 24 teens headed off to the campfire pit. It, like the rest of the island, seemed to them to be well below standard. They were greeted by the seemingly omnipresent Chris Maclean, who gave a dramatic bow and continued his spiel from earlier

"This is Camp Wawanakwa, your home for the next 8 weeks." The campers had, with surprisingly little squabbling, managed to decide who got to sit down and who didn't. All of them were listening somewhat attentively to Chris, or at least as attentively as teenagers get.

"The campers sitting around you will be your cabin mates, your competition, and maybe even your friends. Ya dig?" Chris went on. Harold gave Duncan a smile, who responded by shaking his fist and glaring at the nerd.

"The camper who manages to stay on Total Drama Island the longest without getting voted off will win 100,000 dollars!"

"'Scuse me" asked Duncan "What will the sleeping arrangements be? Because I'd like to request a bunk under her" he gestured to Heather. Heather did not respond to Duncan, instead opting turning to Chris

"They're not co-ed, are they" she asked, a note of worry slipping into her voice

"No. Girls get one side of each cabin, dudes get the other" Heather let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding and a brief muttering of "Oh thank god." Duncan meanwhile, simply wandered off to go bother some wildlife.

"Excuse me, Kyle?" this time it was Lindsay piping up "Can I have the cabin with the lake view since I'm the prettiest?" several female campers showed Lindsay some pointed looks at this comment, chief among them Heather, but she paid no notice

"Okay you are, but that's not really how it works here, and; it's Chris" Lindsay forgetting Chris's name seemed to be the thing that had annoyed him the most so far on the island

"I have to live with Sadie or, I'll die!" said Katie

"And I'll break out in hives, it's true!" said Sadie

"This cannot be happening" lamented Gwen. She lamented even more when Owen caught her and Tyler in a hug that looked like it was cutting off their air supply

"Aw, c'mon guys, it'll be fun! It's like a big sleepover!"

Tyler gestured to Duncan; "At least you don't have to sleep next to him." Duncan, at that moment in time, was giving a passing deer a noogie, which might constitute animal cruelty, but I can't check, my lawyer stopped returning my calls after my seventh conviction.

"Here's the deal!" yelled Chris back at them "We're gonna split you into two teams, so if I call your name out, go stand over there" He gestured to the right-hand side of the campfire pit

"Gwen; Trent; Heather; Cody, Lindsay; Beth; Katie; Adam; Owen -" Chris was cut off from his reading of the list by Owen letting out a loud "WOOO!", the sheer force of which knocked over Tyler. Chris gave Owen a glare, then went back to reading the list

"Leshawna, Justin and; Noah!" the campers who had been mentioned stood up to stand in the general area where Chris had gestured "From this moment onwards you are officially known as: The Screaming Gophers!" Chris proclaimed as he tossed Owen a green banner with an angry looking gopher silhouette on it

"Yeah! I'm a gopher" Owen declared proudly "WOO!"

"Wait!" Katie piped up again "What about Sadie?" Chris ignored her, and continued on the schedule

"The rest of you, over here" he gestured this time to the left-hand side of the campfire "Geoff, Bridgette; DJ; Tyler; Shannon; Sadie; Izzy; Courtney, Ezekiel; Duncan; Eva and; Harold! Move, move move move, move!" The remaining campers all scrambled to the other side of the campfire, minus Sadie and Courtney

"But Katie's a Gopher!" she practically screamed "I have to be a Gopher!"

"Sadie, is it?" Courtney placed a comforting hand on Sadie's shoulder "C'mon, it'll be okay"

"This is so unfair!" Sadie yelled as she let Courtney gently lead her to the rest of her team "I MISS YOU KATIE!" she called to her friend

"I miss you too!" Katie called back as she dropped to her knees in anguish

Meanwhile, Chris had thrown the other team a red banner, which had been caught by Harold

"You guys will officially be known as: The Killer Bass!" the banner was unrolled to reveal another silhouette, this one of an angry looking fish, presumably a bass

"It's awesome" declared Harold "It's like, amazing!" he continued, redundantly.

"Alright campers!" Chris called, getting the attention of everyone who wasn't Katie or Sadie, who were both still reaching out for each other futilely. "You will be on camera in all public areas during this competition."

* * *

**Confession Cam – Oh hey, that's my cue**

Chris: "You will also be able to share your innermost thoughts on tape with video diaries any time you want. Let the audience at home know what you're really thinking. Or, just get something off your chest"

Gwen: "Um, okay; so far this sucks"

Lindsay: "I don't get it, where's the camera guy?" Lindsay asks, standing up and facing the exact wrong way

Duck with lipstick: [Duck noises]

Owen: "Hey everyone, check this out; I have something very important to say" Owen says, not yelling for the first time. He then farts, and begins cackling to himself

* * *

"Alright, any questions?" Chris asked rhetorically "Cool. Let's find your cabins"

* * *

After a brief walk of about 2 minutes, the (mostly reluctant) campers had arrived at the cabins, which, compared to the rest of the campgrounds they'd seen, were in fairly decent condition. Nothing looked like it was going to collapse on them, and both cabins had walls, a door, a roof and no broken windows.

"Gophers, you're in the east cabin; Bass, you're in the west." Chris explained as he gestured to each cabin in turn

The large group split off into its teams, then each team into the boys and girls of each. It was the Gopher girls who made it to their cabin first

"Bunk beds?" Heather said to no-one as she opened the door "Isn't this a little summer camp?"

"That's the idea, genius" Gwen commented as she shoved past her

"Ugh, shut up weird goth girl". It was at that moment the unnoticed tagalong of the girls group made themselves known. It was Cody, who had returned to his love-struck stupor and had been quietly following Gwen since the teams had been announced.

"You're so smart; I feel that" he proclaimed, clearly expecting a reaction other than the one he got. Not sure why, but there you go

"Shouldn't you be on the boys' side?" Gwen asked with a glare. Cody could only grin sheepishly at her as the goth grabbed him by the back of his shirt and threw him out the cabin in a shocking display of strength; he flew a good 6 metres, landed face-first in the dirt and then skidded another 3, firmly embedding him in the ground. The only Gopher boys still outside were Trent and Adam; Trent just gave him a weird look and walked off, while Adam bent down to check on the destitute man's Casanova

"Um, y-you okay?" Cody's response was a series of very muffled murmurs, but it sounded vaguely negative, so Adam continued with his 'help'

"You need a hand?"

"Yth plth." This time Cody's muffled words could actually be interpreted through the dirt around his mouth. Safely assuming it to be a 'yes please', Adam grabbed Cody by the arm and began trying to pull him out the ground, with limited success at best.

"Where are the outlets?" said Lindsay to the host "I have to plug in my straightening iron"

"There are some in the communal bathrooms" Chris responded with a malicious twinkle in his eye "Just across the way"

"Communal bathrooms, but I'm not Catholic?" Lindsay asked, confusion clearly visible on her face. Adam paused in his attempts to pull Cody out the surprisingly deep hole his face had dug to give Lindsay a bemused look, before resuming his pitiful attempts to pull the wannabe ladies' man out of the ground.

"Not 'communion'. Communal" Chris explained. Lindsay still looked confused, so Gwen, who had wandered outside, piped up

"It means we shower together. Idiot" she said as she sat down on the stairs. Lindsay looked like she was about to cry, before wailing to the sky "NOOO! Di-bu-the aww c'mon" The wail was enough to bring severe pain to Gwen's eardrums, draw several Gopher boys out their side of the cabin, and send a hairline crack running though Adam's glasses.

"I'm glad we're in our own cabin, with just guys, know what I mean?" Owen said to Trent and Noah. He chuckled, then realised the implications of what he just said "I mean, no, I didn't mean it like that! I looove chicks; I just don't wanna sleep near them. I mean…!" As Owen raced back inside to try to reassure his bunkmates of his heterosexuality, Adam finally manged to pull Cody out the ground . There was a loud 'POP', and Cody flew a few feet in the air, before landing on his face again a few feet away. He murmured a "Thank you", and Adam pulled him up a lot easier this time. The two trudged back to the cabin, going into the correct side this time.

"Excuse me, Chris" asked Geoff with false innocence "Is there a chaperone of any kind in this facility?"

"You're all 16 years old, as old as a counsellor-in-training at a regular summer camp" Chris said with a knowing look "So, other than myself, you'll be unsupervised. You've got a half an hour to unpack and meet me back at the main lodge, starting now!"

"Nice" cheered Geoff to himself as Chris walked off. Any further conversation was interrupted by an incredibly high-pitched scream from the girls' side of the Gopher cabin, accompanied by the sounds of several panes of glass shattering, and a very loud 'THUD' from the boys' side as someone (that someone being Owen) fell off his bed in surprise. From the Bass cabin, a cry of "Who th' fuck's bein murdered?!" could be heard from Shannon. Tyler, Gwen, DJ, Harold, Heather, Duncan and Leshawna all rushed to see what was going on. Well, Harold tried, but his glasses had shattered along with the windows and he ended up tripping over a log.

"Damn that white girl can scream" noted Leshawna as the group peered into the cabin to reveal Lindsay stood on a stool trying to get as far away from a cockroach as she could

"What is it? Kill it! Kill it!" she panicked, while DJ let out a scream almost as high-pitched as Lindsay's had been and leapt onto a bed, which broke under the impact of the gentle giant.

"That was my bed" Gwen lamented as Harold, who had found another pair of glasses, rushed into the cabin to try and stomp on the bug. Several of the girls jumped onto the beds, Lindsay jumped onto DJ's shoulders, and those left on the floor tried to squish the bug beneath them. Several other campers came running to see what all the commotion was about, though Adam didn't make it as his glasses had also broken from the screaming and he ran into a post. The bug crawled over to Duncan, who had produced a woodsman's axe from somewhere, and he brought the weapon down upon the unsuspecting insect, splitting it, along with several floorboards, in two. There were general murmurs of approval from the crowd.

It was then that Tyler made himself known to the terrified Lindsay "If you ever see one of those again, just let me know, 'cause, y'know" he sniffed "I could do that too". For whatever reason, this attempt at cashing in on someone else's success worked, and Lindsay looked at Tyler like he had just saved her from a burning building.

"They always go for the jocks" said Duncan to the interested parties of no-one. The fuss over the tiny insect still trying to wiggle around despite having been bisected over, the campers headed back to their respective cabins to begin unpacking

* * *

For such a simple task, unpacking somehow managed to take all of allotted half an hour (well, 26 and a half minutes after the cockroach debacle was dealt with) for a large portion of the campers.

The Gopher boys got off the easiest. Once Adam found another pair of glasses (his having also been shattered by Lindsay's scream) and Cody had picked out all the dirt in his teeth, the only person left unpacking was Owen, who had scattered his stuff to the four winds during his tumble off the bed. Once the 2 tons of fun was done gathering his underwear from off Noah's face, much to the Bookworm's chagrin, all the boys were done; and with 10 minutes left before the meet up in the lodge, talked about why they signed up for the show. Justin wanted to use the show to advertise himself to modelling agencies, Trent was looking for something to do during the summer, Owen was just looking for a good time. Noah said he was seeing if his 'fantasyland survival skills could apply to real life', whatever that meant. Cody had said he was looking to, and I quote, "pick up as many girls as he could with his Codemeister charms", accompanied with finger guns. He was met with laughter and a conciliatory pat on the back from Adam. And as for the Wallflower, he never got to answer, as by the time he was done stammering, it was time to leave the cabins for the mess hall.

Their neighbours, the females of the Screaming Gophers, were not having such a pleasant time. Katie was still snivelling over the distinct lack of Sadie in the Gopher cabin. She was the only one unaffected by the commotion in the middle of the room, which was an argument between Heather and Leshawna, with Gwen occasionally providing a few snarky comments directed at the former. Beth and Lindsay were cowering in the corner, trying to get as far away as they could from this devastating clash of alpha females that quickly devolved into little more than an insult-slinging competition, the likes of which would never be seen again outside of contemporary American politics.

The Killer Bass, meanwhile, had things a lot calmer. The male side had almost the exact same discussion as their counterparts in the Screaming Gophers. Duncan was there to win, Harold wanted to test out his mad skills, Ezekiel was signed up by his parents to get him experience interacting with real teenagers; DJ wanted to win the money so he could take his mama back home to Jamaica, Geoff wanted to party hard, and Tyler was there to prove his athletic prowess to any and all sports scouts who may be watching. He demonstrated said prowess with an attempt at a standing jump onto his bed. The result was him smacking his head on the ceiling, bashing his chin on his bed on the way down, the impact of which brought the bed crashing down around Harold, who had been reading a comic book on the bunk beneath.

The girls' side of the Killer Bass, while unable to have this discussion due to incidents in the cabin, were nowhere near the level of dysfunctional the Gopher girls were. Bridgette was trying to console Sadie over the Katie-shaped hole in her heart. No-one wanted to talk to Eva for fear of suffering severe injury, no-one wanted to talk to Izzy because she was insane, and no-one could talk to Shannon even if they wanted to because no-one understood half of what she was saying, which left Courtney able to have a conversation with no-one.

* * *

**The Main Lodge**

"Listen up!" came the yell of the large African-Canadian man stood at the kitchen hatchway of the main lodge. Currently, there was a line of 24 teenagers snaking its way around the hall, almost doing a complete circle of the room. The chef, before serving his food to the campers, had decided he was going to yell at them a bit

"I serve it three times a day! And you will eat it three times a day!" despite being a summer camp cook with a comically undersized chef hat, he gave off the air of an army drill sergeant, and was glaring at the campers with barely contained anger. Presumably he hated this as much as they did.

"Grab your tray, grab your food, and sit your butts down now!" he kept yelling as the first two campers, Beth and Harold, stepped up to the counter. Despite his yelling and his forearms with a similar circumference to your average hubcap, Beth thought it wise to question his culinary practices

"Excuthe me, will we be getting all the major food groupth?" she asked, clearly not as intimidated by the man as she should have been. Chef dropped a blob of reddish-brown… stuff on the tray as Harold piped up

"Yeah, 'cause I get hypoglycaemic real bad if I don't get enough sugar" Harold didn't notice the twitch in Chef's eye as he went on, but everyone in the hall was aware of chef's reaction

"You'll get a whole lotta **SHUT THE HELL UP!**" the angry man yelled at the skinny nerd. Harold ran away as fast as his bony legs could carry him.

"Have a cow" whispered Owen to Noah. Of course, Owen's whisper is the same as a normal person's slightly-quieter-than-normal voice, and Chef overheard

"What was that?!" Owen looked at the chef of short temper with a look of surprise as Chef beckoned him over "Come closer fat boy, I didn't hear you."

"Um, I didn't really say anything important" Owen stammered as Chef continued glaring.

"I'm sure you didn't" Chef turned to Noah "You! Scrawny kid! Gimme your plate" Noah obliged, and chef gave the bookworm an extra helping of slop. The slop then proceeded to jump back onto Chef's ladle. Chef shook the stuff off again, and this time it stayed on Noah's plate. Noah stared at it with a raised eyebrow and a deeply troubled look on his face, and ran off to join Owen.

Further down the line, Leshawna was attempting to make friends with Eva, approaching her the best way she knew how, with a "Yo wassup girl". Eva's only response was to glare at Leshawna, then grab her food and stalk off. "Oh it's gonna be like that, is it?" Leshawna responded after Eva was out of earshot. From behind the sister, Shannon let out a snort and slapped Leshawna on the back

"Ah, dinnae worry about the Bridge Troll, she's had a stick up her arse since we got here" the Scot proclaimed happily, noticing too late that her friendly slap had sent the other girl crashing to the floor. "Oops" she chuckled nervously as she held out her hand to pick Leshawna up, blissfully unaware of the look of pure hatred Eva was giving her.

"Damn, you one crazy strong white girl ain't ya?" Shannon shrugged as she helped the other girl up

"Happens when ye grow up in Glasgow. Ye should see me da', he makes Heston Blumenthal here look like a dormouse"

"What was that?!" came the yell of a rather irate Chef. Shannon just smiled innocently as she picked up her tray "Nothin to worry yerself over, Heston." She let out a laugh when she saw a vein pop in his forehead. As Shannon walked off, Chef turned angrily to Leshawna

"You got any smart comments, maggot?" Leshawna shook her head and grabbed her food, not wanting to risk blowing the volcano that was Chef.

More and more campers filed on through; Duncan tried acting smart about the food and got a face full of slop for his troubles, Izzy began diving into her food at the counter, not bothering with utensils or even her hands; Adam received a similar treatment to Noah, only he received three helpings instead of two, and he could have sworn his food was glaring at him; Heather looked about to complain, but a glare from Chef quickly shut her up; Trent poked his slop with his fork, and the slop poked the fork back. Eventually, the last two campers to get their food showed up: Lindsay and Gwen.

"Excuse me, my nutritionist says I shouldn't eat anything with white sugar, white flour, or like, dairy" Chef ignored the blonde, instead focussing on a fly buzzing around his head. He caught it first try, and the squish of its death was audible to both girls. Gwen glanced down at her food

"I don't think that's gonna be a problem" she commented as her slop twitched. Lindsay, ever oblivious to just about everything, just replied "Cool!" and happily picked up her tray and walked off. Gwen, meanwhile, had a bit more to say

"Okay, I hate to be predictable and complain on the first day, but I think mine just moved." Chef said nothing, and instead procured a mallet from under the counter, and smashed the slop, sending bits of it flying all over both himself and the goth, his expression never changing throughout.

"Right. Okay then" was all Gwen could muster as she flashed a fake smile and rushed off away from the mad chef

Things were dour at the Gopher table. Most of the campers were trying to get through the slop with small bits to try and limit the amount of the stuff they let into their system at a time. The exception to this was Owen, who had simply lifted his tray above his head and tipped the contents into his mouth. After a few seconds of chewing, he spat out the plate, which was somehow still intact. Everyone else looked at him weirdly. A few seats down, Katie was reaching out longingly for Sadie, who was sat as close as the Bass table would allow her. Two seats down from Katie, Heather had taken one bite of the slop and immediately spat it out, and was now glaring at it as if expecting it to morph into something more palatable. Next to her, Noah had given up resisting and was just trying to get through the stuff as fast as he could. At the end of the bench, Gwen was just staring dejectedly at her meal, trying not to think of the terrible decisions that had led her to this place. Across from Gwen, Trent had adopted the same strategy as Noah, though his eating was interrupted by the occasional sidelong glance at the goth across from him, which Gwen seemed to ignore. In the seat beside Gwen, Cody took one mouthful, then immediately spat it out. He gave up trying to eat that and pulled a chocolate bar out of his pocket and began nomming on that, not noticing the death glare Chef shot him when he saw the sweet. While eating said cocoa-based confectionary, he kept trying to start a conversation with the camper next to him, which was Adam. Adam however, clearly did not have conversation with other people in him yet, as he kept stuttering and clamming up whenever the conversation called for responses of more than a few words. He hadn't even bothered trying his meal, instead pulling a sodden sandwich out from his hat and eating that instead. When Chef saw this, his death glare intensified. This glare Adam noticed, and he tried to make himself smaller that he already was, an impressive feat to say the least.

At the Bass table, things were going a little better. For starters, there was more than one person apparently enjoying Chef's cooking. Izzy, as mentioned previously, had just dove straight in, and was finished earlier than any of her teammates, her face covered in twitching, rust-coloured slop. Ezekiel, meanwhile, was eating the food like a normal person; presumably prairie food was comparable to whatever it was Chef made. The final camper enjoying their meal was Shannon, who was tucking into the meal with gusto. When questioned on this by Courtney, she just responded with "When ye've tasted the shite me da' calls cookin, anythin edible becomes a godsend". Courtney, meanwhile, was not enjoying her meal. She kept poking at it, taking a tiny bite, and then making a face as if she'd just sucked on several lemons. Duncan, used to terrible cooking from his time in Juvie, was just powering though as best he could, as were Tyler, Eva, DJ and Geoff. Harold, however was struggling, and after about 4 mouthfuls he spat it out with a "Gosh! This tastes like cat food." Finally, Bridgette had just refused to eat the food, justifying it with her being vegetarian and the slop clearly being alive.

As the campers ate their, uh, 'food', the aura of ego that preceded Chris Maclean washed over the mess hall, and a few seconds later, the man himself arrived, with a "Welcome to the main lodge" that was completely redundant seeing as they'd all been there for 10 minutes. The only person to respond to this was Geoff

"Yo, my man, can we order a pizza?" Any response Chris may or may not have given was cut off by Chef hurling a meat cleaver just over the boy's head, taking Geoff's hat with it and impaling the two on the wall.

"Whoa! It's cool G! Brown slop is cool! Right guys?" all the other campers frantically nodded in agreement. Except Adam, who's food decided to leap off the plate and at him, but no-one paid him any attention. Completely unfazed by this attempt on one of his camper's lives, Chris went on in his same, smug voice

"Your first challenge begins in one hour!" he proudly proclaimed as he left. A few seconds of silence passed, which were interrupted by a loud '**SLAM**' as Adam crushed his hostile lunch beneath his notebook. The slop flew all over the place, painting a nice recreation of a Picasso on the wall, and sailing between several Gopher heads to land squarely in Heather's face. Adam let out a faint whimper as Heather wiped the slop off her and shot a look at the wallflower that would have killed a herd of elephants, had looks been given such power over life and death. No-one else paid Adam any attention as Sadie turned to DJ

"What do you think they'll make us do?"

"It's our first challenge, how hard can it be?" DJ replied with a confident smile on his face

"Gosh, way to jinx us!" Cried Harold from the other side of the table. Under his breath, he muttered a much quieter "Idiot!"

* * *

Atop the impractically tall cliff of Wawanakwa Island stood the 24 campers and 1 host. All campers were clad in their swimwear, and it was painfully obvious what Chris was going to have them do. DJ was the first to speak.

"Oh shit"

"I told you so" said Harold

* * *

**So concludes the actual chapter 1 of Genesis of the Island. We're back to the where it all began with two additions, because what the fuck even _is_ originality any more. In retrospect, I used far too much of the canon episode than I should've. But, I've planned most of this out, and we should see serious divergence by the Awake-A-Thon.  
**

**But anyway, what did you think? Like it? Hate it? Don't care either way? Please, leave a review, whether it's saying its good, saying its bad, saying nothing in particular, actual constructive criticism, or calling me a two-faced illiterate son of half a dozen whores with bad breath and gout. Anything works really.**

**Special thanks go to my university, for providing me with a free copy of Microsoft Office, the usual suspects of writers (Kobold Nechronometer, Winter Rae-Gun, Jason Krueger Austin Powers, Rufus The Serendipity, and every other author on this site I've read whose names I couldn't come up with an affectionate misnomer for) for inspiring this; and lastly, thanks to my shift key for not working half the time, you inconsiderate fuck.**


	2. A Short Walk off a Loooooooooooong Cliff

**THE FOLLOWING IS A NONPROFIT FAN-BASED WORK OF FICTION  
****THE TOTAL DRAMA FRANCHISE IS OWNED BY FRESH TV, TELETOON, JENNIFER PERTSCH AND TOM MCGILLIS  
****PLEASE SUPPORT THE OFFICIAL RELEASE**

**Content Warning:** Second verse, same as the first, but a little bit louder and a little bit worse. About sums up the chapter as a whole, honestly

* * *

Atop the impractically tall cliff of Wawanakwa Island stood the 24 campers and 1 host. All campers were clad in their swimwear, and it was painfully obvious what Chris was going to have them do. Thanks to the power of editing, this time it was Gwen who spoke.

"I did not sign up for this"

* * *

As thus the title sequence played for the first time, which, after a few shots of the lights and cameras so associated with showbusiness, turned into a one take shot that showed genuinely impressive cinematographic skills from whoever was responsible (those responsible being the duo of unpaid editor Jeremy, who applied in order to further his dreams of working in the film industry; and unpaid cameraman Nate, who got the job after filming his younger brother falling off a roof and uploading it to YouTube)

It began at the docks, soaring up and across them and through to the cabin area, where Chris was sat in a director's chair sipping a drink. The camera raced past Chris, wobbling the chair in the process, and began rapidly climbing the cliff, atop which was sat Adam. The camera raced past him as well, sending him off the cliff and into the water; it followed, diving beneath the surface to reveal Owen swimming along underwater. He farted to propel himself forwards, and the camera began tracking the bubbles upwards to where Bridgette and Geoff were sat together on a surfboard, giving each other suggestive looks. Or at least they were until they smelt Owen's emissions. A few feet away, Adam surfaced, spitting out a fish, which was caught in mid-air by an eagle.

The eagle flew off to the forest, where it dropped the fish, which landed on DJ, who was surrounded by a bunch of friendly woodland creatures. When the fish landed however, the friendly woodland creatures went berserk and sank their teeth into him, and DJ ran away screaming in pain. This was witnessed by Duncan, who began laughing at the Gentle Giant's misfortune, until Courtney revealed herself and shot Duncan a glare, who quickly stopped laughing.

The camera then dived through the trees to the river, where Leshawna and Heather were riding an inflatable raft together, slap-fighting all the way. They stopped when they went over the waterfall, the camera following them down to reveal Harold stood on a log practicing martial arts moves. He was quickly interrupted by Izzy swinging in on a vine and colliding with him, sending them both flying into the confessional outhouse, the impact knocking Lindsay out of the confessional cam, while the door slammed into Tyler, sending him flying.

The camera panned to the left and went through the window of the mess hall, pausing briefly on Chef Hatchet stirring a vat of… something with his hands. The burly chef glanced behind him at Noah and Ezekiel, both of whom were tied up and nervously awaiting their fate. Down the counter a few feet were Eva and Shannon, who were engaged in an arm wrestle that ended when Eva slammed Shannon's arm down onto the counter so hard that it shattered under the impact and both girls were sent crashing to the floor.

The shot zoomed back out through a different window and went down to the beach, where Katie and Sadie were sat on the stairs, admiring Justin, who was admiring himself in a pair of hand mirrors. It then panned to Immobile Seagull in the water, who sat there unmoving as a fish jumped over him, followed by a shark, which ate the fish in mid-air and dived back down. A tentacle then shot from the water in the shark's wake and grabbed the seagull, who remained motionless even as it was pulled underwater.

The final pan of the shot finished on Beth, who was stood at the end of the dock twirling a flaming baton, she did a few tricks, and finished with a toss into the air, where the one-take shot finally ended, with the fire baton spinning its way into the night.

The camera flew down one last time, revealing Gwen and Trent smiling at each other, Gwen looking normal and Trent looking slightly manic; Cody then popped up in-between them, placing his arm on each of their shoulders and smiling happily, completely oblivious to the looks of shock both were giving him

* * *

"Okay, today's challenge is threefold: your first task is to jump off this 1,000-foot high cliff into the lake!" The amount of gusto in Chris's voice when he described teenagers hurling themselves off a cliff was enough to make the campers nervous. Or at least those who weren't already scared out of their minds. Some, however, seemed fine with this task.

Case in point being Bridgette, who's only response was "piece of cake" in a voice far too calm given the situation. But Chris wasn't done.

"If you look down, you will see two target areas: the wider area represents the part of the lake that we have stocked with psychotic man-eating sharks!" The glee in Chris's voice was reaching concerning levels. "Inside that area is a safe zone: that's your target area, which we're pretty sure is shark free"

"Excuse me?" Leshawna wasn't buying it, not that Chris cared

"For each member of your team that jumps and actually survives, there will be a crate of supplies waiting below. Inside each crate are the supplies you'll need for the second part of the challenge: building a hot tub! The team with the best one gets to have a wicked hot tub party tonight; the losers will be sending someone home" Chris then pulled out a coin, tossed it, and declared that the Killer Bass were up first.

It was Bridgette who was the first to work up the courage to go to the edge of the cliff and look all the way down, her prior confidence forgotten at the mention of sharks.

"Oh wow. So, who wants to go first?" she turned to her team, who were all standing a good few feet back; the exception was Shannon, who was standing as far back as physically possible. None of them seemed willing to volunteer. Meanwhile, in the Gopher conglomeration, Owen was on hand with some helpful advice:

"Hey, don't sweat it guys, I heard these shows always make the interns do the stunt first to make sure it's survivable." Upon hearing this, Chris began chuckling to himself for reasons unknown to the campers

* * *

_3 days ago, Wawanakwa Cliff_

"We need to test the stunts first, you know that."

Chris, as it turned out, was not talking to an intern. He was talking to Chef Hatchet, who was clad in purple swimming shorts and had a rubber ring on. For whatever reason, he was still wearing his chef hat. Maybe it's glued on there. Or a growth. But regardless of whether or not Chef's hat was a permanent feature, he was not happy with being made to jump off a cliff

"Do I look like an intern?"

"No" Perhaps Chris was maybe seeing reason "But the ones we had are all in the hospital. C'mon, just jump it you big chicken." Then again, perhaps not. To add insult to (imminent) injury, Chris then began to make chicken noises at Chef, who quickly capitulated with an "I don't get paid enough for this, man."

Letting his goggles fly onto his face with a painful sounding 'SNAP', Chef then jumped off the cliff with a manly "AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

8 seconds later, Chef splashed down a few feet away from the safe zone. But, in his jubilation at having survived the jump, Chef did not notice something was amiss until one of the sharks brushed up against his leg. A few seconds later Chef disappeared beneath the waves, only to resurface almost immediately, and, in a feat that still astounds me, ran away across the surface of the lake as a shark chased him.

"Well, that seems safe enough" commented Chris from atop the cliff, ticking 'cliff dive' off of his list of 'insane things to get teenagers to do' (it was sandwiched between 'break into secure government facility' and 'jump out a plane')

* * *

On the cliff, the campers were unaware of Chris's brief trip down memory lane, and Eva was beginning to get impatient with her team's lack of jumping

"So; who's up?" she asked, not considering the possibility that it could be her. Neither did her teammates, as the only response she got was a "Ladies first" from Duncan, delivered in a mockingly suave tone that makes my skin crawl a little. No-one paid attention to Shannon continuing to back away from the cliff even further, as Bridgette was taking one for the team, as it were.

"Fine. I'll go. It's no big deal. Just an insane cliff dive into a circle of angry sharks" she lamented. She took a few breaths to steel herself, clicked her neck, stretched her arms, and all sorts of other delaying tactics, until she finally jumped, performing an elegant dive straight into the safe zone, to which Izzy procured a score card out of nowhere and gave it an 8.5. Bridgette gave the campers on the cliff a wave. This successful jump, and the happy wave, had caused Tyler to do a complete 180, from terrified to almost too excited.

"She did it! Yeah! Yeah! I'm next!" He jogged back a few paces, then sprinted to the edge and launched himself off the cliff with a "**COWABUNGA!**"

The sounds that followed were a very loud '**CLANG**' and a cry of pain as Tyler smashed into one of the buoys that formed the border of the safe zone. All the other campers winced in sympathy as Tyler slid down the buoy and into the safe zone. How he survived a thousand-foot drop onto solid metal is beyond me, but that's neither here nor there.

Atop the cliff, it appeared that Izzy was undeterred by the poor landing of her fellow Bass, launching herself off the cliff with a what sounded almost like a battle cry, cannonballing into the safe zone while cackling maniacally, the splash soaking the boat Bridgette was hauling Tyler onto.

Back on the cliff, it appeared as though despite their strong start, the Killer Bass had hit a roadblock when Duncan noticed Shannon's great distance from the cliff.

"Hey Cyclops, where are you going?" Upon being called out, Shannon wheeled around far too fast, her one visible eye wide with panic

"Me? I was just, ah, makin sure none of ye does a runner." She laughed nervously "Yeah. That"

No-one bought it, especially not Duncan

"Really? You sure you're not scared?" he asked, a malicious grin plastered on his face. The fear in Shannon's eye became thinly masked with defiance, and the nervousness in her voice shifted to panicked denial

"No!"

"Okay, then why not go next?" Shannon's expression shifted again, now onto a 'deer in the headlights' look

"I, ah, er" she let out a frustrated sigh "fine."

She stomped on over to the cliff edge, muttering under her breath things that no-one could make out, but her tone of voice implied violence. As she approached the cliff edge, her pace got slower and slower. When she was a few steps away, she turned back to her team. The only reaction she got was a smug smirk from Duncan, who gestured her forwards. She gulped, and walked up to the cliff edge. She peered over the edge, and her face paled.

"Oh fuck me" was all she could utter before her eye(s?) rolled back and she fainted, luckily falling backwards onto the ground, rather than forwards off the cliff.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Someone do a flip already**

Shannon: "I's no' mah fault I been scareda heights since I were four! Stupid bloody Chris Mc-fuckin-Clean, makin' us jump off a fuckin cliff oan day one"

* * *

After Shannon was carried down the cliff by Chef Hatchet, three Bass jumps came in quick succession: first was Geoff, plunging down with his fists in the air screaming "WOO-HOO!"; then came Eva, who simply yelled "Look out below!". Duncan was last, who fell in total silence with his arms folded.

Back at the top, it appeared as though Shannon was not the only person with altitude issues.

"Uh-uh. No way man. I'm not jumping" confessed DJ as he backed away from the cliff. It was the that Chris, who had been unusually silent, chimed back in

"Scared of heights?" he asked in a tone that when said by a normal person would be sympathetic

"Yeah, ever since I was a kid"

"That's okay big guy. Unfortunately, that also makes you a chicken!" the false sympathy disappeared from Chris's voice, and he procured a chicken hat out from somewhere and slapped it on DJ's head "So, you'll have to wear this for the rest of the day!"

"Aw man, for real?" Chris responded with chicken noises, then some more absent sympathy "That means the chicken path down is thataway." He gestured to an escalator which somehow no-one had noticed. As DJ was trudging towards it, Chris called out one more time

"Oh, and don't worry about the hat: Shannon will get one when she wakes up!" DJ kept trudging, while Chris yelled "Next!"

Up next was in fact Ezekiel, who leapt of the cliff with a "YEE-HAW!" which was cut short when he slammed into some rocks on the way down and was sent spinning into the safe zone. The Bass on the beach, which was all the jumpers and an unconscious Shannon, all cheered (except Shannon, for obvious reasons), apparently unconcerned as to their teammates wellbeing. But, it all worked out in the end, as Ezekiel popped up from the water and gave them a thumbs up.

Back up top, Harold was 10th in line, giving a proud "Yes!" before jumping with a yell of excitement. The yell did not last long, however, as Harold landed badly on the water, slamming into the lake groin first. He let out an incredibly pained yell which sent birds flying from the trees, and his fellow campers, Chef, the sharks and even Chris gave a sympathetic wince as Harold kept screaming and slowly sank down in the water.

The agonised shout did have one benefit in that it woke up Shannon, who bolted upright with a string of Scottish nonsense words. She immediately had her chicken hat slapped on by Chef.

"What th' fuck is thes then?" she asked the burly man

"Chicken hat. Wear it or you're outta here, girly." Shannon folded her arms, rolled her eye and growled

Up on the cliff, Chris was still focussed on Harold's misfortune.

"Ooh, hate to see that happen." Next to him was Courtney, who seemed unconcerned with the Nerd's horrible, horrible pain.

"Excuse me Chris, I have a medical condition." And in a shocking twist, Chris actually listened

"What condition?"

"A condition that prevents me from jumping off cliffs." She said as if she expected it to work. And work it did not

"You can chicken out if you want, but it might end up costing your team then win. And then they'll hate you." Courtney however, was not put off

"It's a calculated risk. I've seen the other team, and I don't think 9 of them will jump." She turned to the Screaming Gophers, and to be fair, her assessment wasn't entirely unfounded. Noah looked bored out of his skull, Adam was fidgeting nervously, Justin was admiring himself in a mirror _again_, Cody was gazing dreamily at Gwen, said Goth also looked bored out of her skull, Lindsay was checking her hair, Beth was shaking like a leaf, and Katie was still reaching out for Sadie.

Taking such a comment as an agreement to chicken out, Chris procured another chicken hat and placed it on the CIT's head. "Alright, here is you chicken hat. So, let's tally up the results. Hold on." After several seconds of counting on his fingers, he continued "That's 8 jumpers and 3 chickens. We're missing one." He found the missing one when he turned to Sadie, who was holding hands with Katie.

"I'm not jumping without Katie" she declared in a surprising show of defiance. Her other half agreed.

"We have to be on the same team Chris! Pleeeeaaaaase!" And with that, the two jumped over to Chris and began begging the sadistic host to allow the switch, first with a chorus of elongated "please"s, then a flurry of "can we?"s, then a cacophonous mix of the two.

Chris remained unphased. "In order, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no and no." At the host's refusal, the two fell to the ground and began sobbing.

"Well, I'll take that as a pass." He pulled out two chicken hats and dumped them unceremoniously on the two girls' heads, then turned to Chef, who had just come back up the escalator "Chef! Get these two down the bottom" Chef, having only just returned from the bottom of the cliff, let out a growl of frustration, and picked up both girls and dragged them to the back down.

"Okay, so that's 8 jumpers and 4 chickens. Screaming Gophers, if you can beat that we'll throw in a pull cart to put your crates on"

"Nice" was the only response, coming from Trent. "Okay guys, who's up first?" The Gophers looked at each other for a bit, before eventually Heather piped up

"I'm sorry, there's no way I'm doing this"

"Why not?" asked Beth, expecting a reasonable answer along the lines of 'fear' or 'terror' or 'aprehension'

"Hello, national TV? I'll get my hair wet" replied Heather, disappointing and/or aggravating everyone. Two of the latter could be found in Gwen and Leshawna

"You're kidding right?" asked Gwen, presumably rhetorically

"If she's not doing it I'm not doing it" chimed in Lindsay unhelpfully

"Oh you're doing it" said Leshawna in a threatening tone

"Says who?" Heather shot back

"Says me! I'm not losing this challenge 'cause you got yo hair did, you spoiled little daddy's girl." Beth and Lindsay's eyes widened and they began staring off into the middle distance as the PTSD flashbacks to the argument in the cabin an hour prior began.

And so, atop the improbably high cliffs of Wawanakwa, an insult slinging match the likes of which would never be seen outside of contemporary political discourse begun. Barbs insulting people's lineage, the purity of their mothers, and all possible aspects of their very existence were hurled, all witnessed by the rest of the Screaming Gophers, who could do naught but look on in horror. Except one

As Leshawna insulted Heather's shopping habits, Noah decided he'd had enough, and trudged off to the edge of the cliff and peered over the edge

* * *

**Confession Cam – Cat fight, cat fight, cat fight!**

Noah:"I've seen arguments like this before, they go on for hours. I figured I'd just jump: I'd either pass, or I'd die. Either way, it gets me away from those two"

* * *

No-one noticed Noah take the one-step shortcut to the beach as the two alpha females continued their constant wave of vitriol, except Chris, who just checked off a box on his clipboard, and went back to the real show.

But there was not much more show to be had, as Heather had taken it upon herself to end the contest of tongue-lashings.

"Well at least I'm popular" she declared with a smug smirk. There was silence, punctuated only by the '**sploosh**' of Noah landing in the safe zone.

What flimsy strands of pretence were finally dropped as the two girls leaned in closer, glaring coldly at the other, as Leshawna firmly asserted "You're jumping!"

"Make me" Heather replied, saying the exact worst thing she could have said at that moment in time. Leshawna hoisted the Queen Bee over her head, and marched over to the cliff edge, ignoring the increasingly panicked protests of her unwilling passenger. She tossed Heather off the cliff, demonstrating remarkable accuracy in the process as Heather splashed down right in the middle of the safe zone, about a metre to the left of where Noah had finally surfaced.

"Nice of you to finally drop in." Heather ignored him

"Leshawna, you are so dead!" she yelled up at the cliff once she'd stopped spluttering.

"Hey, I threw you into the safe zone, didn't I?" She called back "Now I just hope I can hit it too."

She jumped, also making the safe zone, where she surfaced next to Heather, who shot her a glare

"I thought this was going to be a talent contest" Lindsay wailed from the cliff edge, clearly terrified. Chris, the sadistic git he is, just laughed at the poor girls misfortune

"Hahaha, yeah, ha ha, no."

Lindsay jumped, complete with high pitched screaming and flailing arms, closely followed by Gwen, who was screaming almost in baritone; then came Cody, whose scream managed to be the highest pitch of all so far, and after that was Adam, who was clutching his hat to his head and muttering a prayer to whatever deities would listen.

Following on from this, Justin jumped, performing an elegant swan dive that landed him right outside the safe zone. He stood up (somehow), just as the sharks began swimming towards him and the campers in the boat yelled at him to paddle. Justin turned towards the sharks, who paused and began staring dreamily at him. Even sharks, it seems, cannot resist the charms of Justin (What can? (I'm still straight)). The sharks carried Justin to shore, while up on the cliff Beth was having confidence issues

"I- I can't do it. I'm to thcared." Chris produced a chicken hat as Beth yelled an "I'm thorry!" to the others. Leshawna and Cody, displaying the sympathy that teenagers are known for, made chicken noises as Beth made her way to the escalator. Meanwhile, on the beach, it seemed even Lindsay was a trifle put out

"That is like, so lame" she turned to Heather, who was stood behind her "right?"

"Fully lame" was the curt response

As Beth walked away from the cliff in shame, Trent walked towards it with confidence

"Let's do this!" He gave Owen a hi-five as he broke into a sprint, leaping off the cliff with a rather tuneful "YEEEAAAAH!"

As Trent landed, Chris turned to the last remaining Gopher, Owen.

"Owen! So, you don't technically _need_ to jump." Owen, naturally, turned around to leave the cliff the safe way down. "But I want you to. So, here's the deal: you jump, and if your team wins, I'll throw in a pizza." At this new information, Owen's eyes lit up, and he sprinted towards the edge, only to halt dead in his tracks a few inches before the jump by the sound of a yell coming from the bottom of the cliff

"What kind of pizza?" It was Cody, who seemed to not notice his teammates looking at him funny "Because I can't have chili or I'll like, die." His teammates continued to give him funny looks, before Leshawna shrugged and yelled up at the cliff

"Yo, if we're putting in requests, nothing with pineapple!" This got her a funny look from Trent, who had just finished his swim from the safe zone.

"No way man, pineapple is the best pizza"

"Are you outta your mind, white boy?" While Leshawna and Trent got into the age-old argument of whether or not pineapple belongs on pizza, Lindsay chimed in with her two cents

"I dunno, pizza is pretty fattening, can I get a salad?" That was the last discernible statement before the entire team dissolved into the Pizza War of '07, while the Killer Bass just looked on their rivals with confusion.

"How are we losing to **them**?!" Courtney asked to no-one in particular. In this instance, Duncan took 'no-one in particular' to mean 'him'.

"Probably because _someone_ didn't jump when she could've." Courtney's only response was a disgruntled "ugh"

Meanwhile, up on the cliff, Chris and Owen were looking at the mess that was the campers with even more confusion that the Killer Bass. Eventually Chris turned to Owen.

"Dude, just jump." Owen nodded, and walked towards the edge, pulling on arm bands as he went

* * *

**Confession Cam – I'm partial to a four seasons pizza if anyone cares**

Owen: "I was pretty darn nervous" he shrugs "See, the thing is, I'm not that strong a swimmer."

Geoff: "I'm looking at this guy, and thinking there's no way he's gonna make it"

Gwen: "I actually thought if he jumps this, he's gonna die"

* * *

"I'm going to die now. I'm going to freakin' die now." With that final lament out of the way, Owen took several paces back, and sprinted off the cliff, screaming in terror all the way.

He landed in the safe zone, nearly crushing the returning Immobile Seagull, and the impact caused a tidal wave that washed up the gull, beached the boat, launched the sharks into the trees, and scattered the campers across the beach, finally ending the Pizza War. While one of the sharks attempted to lower itself from the tree, Owen washed up, cheering all the way

"Yes! Yeah! Oh yeah! Who's the man?!" several Gophers began cheering, while Chris declared from atop the cliff, "The winners, the Screaming Gophers!"

Still in the shallows, Owen began looking through the water for something, while Trent popped up from behind the beached boat to congratulate him

"That was awesome dude," then, he noticed Owen's searching "What's wrong?"

"I, uh, think I lost my bathing suit"

This revelation was met with a chorus of "ew"s, as someone tossed Owen a towel, as the rest of the campers dried themselves off and prepared for the next part of the challenge

* * *

_17 and a half minutes of drying later_

Having finally dried off, most of that time being taken by Lindsay fussing over her hair, the two teams grouped up to began hauling their crates to the cabins. The Gophers, who clearly possessed the advantage, got to work fairly quickly, with each person hauling a crate, with the exceptions of Adam and Beth, who were to weak to pull one each and thus doubled up, and Katie, who was too busy moping and no-one, not even Heather in full Queen Bee mode, could get her to stop, so she trailed behind the others. Spirits were high among the currently leading team, the Pizza War forgotten among them, and they were all happily chatting amongst themselves. Well, most of them were. Justin was being as eerily silent as usual, no-one wanted to talk to Heather, Noah didn't want to talk to anyone, Katie was still moping, and as for Adam and Beth, well, their attempts at conversation speak for themselves

"Stho, have you ever been on an island like thisth before?" Beth asked from the right hand side of the pull cart. Adam turned to look at her startled, and attempted to provide a response, but all that came out were a few stammering noises and a sort of nervous gurgle. After that disastrous attempt, he just shook his head 'no'. Fortunately for him, Beth took the inability to converse in her stride, and kept going

"There'sth woodsth around where I live, but nothing thisth big! Do you have anything like thisth where you live?" Adam thought for a moment, and opened his mouth, but this time not even a sound came out. He closed it and again shook his head, his eyes constantly shifting nervously. Beth looked at him quizzically.

"You don't talk much, do you?" Adam gulped and looked at the ground in what can only assumed to be shame

While this disaster of a conversation was taking place, the Killer Bass had far more pressing concerns than poor social skills. Only three members of the team were capable of carrying the crates rather than pushing or dragging, those three being Eva, Tyler and Shannon, the former of which had managed to hoist two of the things over her head. The rest were left trailing a bit behind, trying various methods of possible transport, all met with limited success at best. DJ was rolling his along the beach, and encountering the problems associated with rolling a cube; Geoff was putting his all into trying to push the crate along the beach, every step causing the crate to sink slightly lower into the sand; and Duncan even tried kicking his across the beach, which was probably the least efficient method of transport. The plight of the Bass wasn't helped by the fact that Sadie was still weeping over the absence of Katie, and that Harold was still out of commission thanks to his earlier injury, not that his spindly frame could've moved the crates very far.

And so it was that while the Gophers began a hearty singalong of '99 Bottles of Pop', the Bass continued their miserable struggle across the beach of Wawanakwa Island, beset on all sides by fatigue and injury. Well, only one injury, which happened to Courtney, who suddenly stopped pushed her crate and exclaimed

"Ow! I think I just got a splinter." The only person who acknowledged her was Eva, who dropped the two crates she had over her head, stomped over to Courtney, and picked up her crate for no reason

"Shut up and pick up your crate," she said as she slammed the crate down "chicken." So I guess that was the point: emphasis.

"Hey, I'm the only one with CIT camping experience here; you need me!". Eva's glare narrowed, and she looked ready to start a fight. She took a stomp towards Courtney, arm raising towards the sky, and her mouth opening ready to rebut Courtney's declaration of usefulness.

But she was cut off from any such rebuttals when Shannon, apparently having sensed the incoming conflict, imposed herself between the two with her arms outstretched, trying desperately to keep the peace

"Whoa-ho-kay, le's no' kill each other day one, tha's jis' givin' them th' win". A reasonable statement; but sadly, Eva did not want peace to be kept, for she was in a bad mood, and thus liable to yell.

"Oh look, the chickens are flocking together, what a surprise." Eva's glare somehow got even fiercer, and now it was trained wholly on Shannon. "_You_ shut up and stay out of my way". The glare and possible threat did nothing to phase Shannon it seemed.

"And what the hell crawled up yer' arse an' died?" she asked, raising her one visible eyebrow.

"You did!" Eva seemed unaware of the innuendo-of-sorts she just made, for she was far too angry. Shannon, however, did notice, and in a display of a massive lack of self-preservation, saw the perfect opportunity to mess with the incredibly angry girl. She wiggled her one visible eyebrow, and smirked at Eva.

"At least buy me a drink first". Eva looked confused for about a second and a half. Then she became extremely, earth-shatteringly, unreasonably fuck-ass mad. She growled, her hands closed into fists, and she levelled a glare at Shannon that would send the armies of Sparta running home crying for their mothers. It was this that finally caused Shannon's human survival instinct to kick in. Her face fell into a worried frown, and she began carefully backing away from Eva, who was now advancing on her.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Actual fight, actual fight, actual fight!**

Shannon: "Note tae self: get brain tae mouth filter."

* * *

Meanwhile, slightly further ahead of the rapidly escalating incident, Harold had finally recovered from his grievous injury, and was walking alongside Ezekiel, attempting to slowly integrate the hopelessly naïve prairie kid into the real world. However, Harold was not the right person to do this, as he's spent the majority of the conversation recommending various comics, tv shows, something called 'animey', and mangoes I think. Eh, nerds, go figure.

But, at that moment in time, there was a lull in the conversation, and Ezekiel took that time to ask Harold a question that had been on his mind for some time now

"Say, Haroold," 'Haroold' looked up at the mispronunciation of his name, and Ezekiel took that as a sign to continue "doon't you think we should be helping the girls?" Now Haroold just looked confused.

"Why do you say that?" He asked, giving Ezekiel a quizzical look

"Well, my dad told me to help out the girls here, because guys are much stronger than girls are, eh." At this, Harold gave a disappointed sigh, placed an arm on Ezekiel's shoulder, and adopted the sagest expression he could muster.

"You have much to learn about the real world, padawan. See, while such a fact may be true across populations, on an individual level-" Harold would likely have broken into a long-winded explanation about gender dimorphism and other such related gobbledygook, but thankfully he was cut off by an enraged yell of:

"**GET BACK HERE!**" The two boys wheeled around to look at the source of the noise, only to come face to face with Shannon, who was running straight at them

"Sorry Beanpole, gotta run, tryin' nae tae die, see ya!" She hurriedly explained as she grabbed Harold's head and pushed down, leapfrogging over the nerd in one deft motion. The force was enough to send Harold falling, and he landed in a heap. Ezekiel looked worried as he turned around again to see Eva, face contorted with rage, charging at Shannon.

The path of the charge took her directly over Harold, and she trampled him in her furious run, her feet coming down hard on both his knee and his back.

"**OUT OF MY WAY**!" she screamed as she went. By this point, Ezekiel was wide eyed in terror, and Harold was moaning about pains in his anterolateral ligament and pancreas.

* * *

**Confession Cam – My uncle hurt his anterolateral ligament once. Poor bastard could never have sex again**

Ezekiel: He scratches his chin in thought "I think these girls can take care of themselves, eh"

Eva: "First she calls me a bitch, then she calls me a bridge troll, then she makes fun of me to my face?" she slams her fist into her palm "She is going down!"

* * *

Having knocked over 71 metaphysical bottles of pop for no reason other than passing the time, the Screaming Gophers were the first to arrive at camp by a whole 43 bottles of pop, which my sources tell me is used as a measurement of time in one of the lesser known Amazon tribes.

As the Bass continued their struggle, with Courtney's eye now swelling up after a bug bit it (egh, eye stuff weirds me out), the Gophers were struggling with the next part of the challenge: opening the crates. Normally, this wouldn't be much of a problem, just get a crowbar, maybe a hammer, or just give it a really good kick, but Chris, the sadistic man that he is, added a twist, one he cruelly reminded the Gophers off as he walked among them

"Remember, you guys can only use your teeth to open the crates," he paused to smile smugly at the camera, "I came up with that one."

Several methods were employed by the campers: Trent and Noah tried attacking the same crate from both sides, Owen was headbutting the crate and tried to justify it by saying he was hitting the crate with his teeth, Cody tried going full beaver on the crates, and Beth had the idea of magnifying light through Adam's glasses onto her braces, then off of her braces onto the crate. Nothing was working particularly well, resulting in naught but splinters in gums and Adam accidentally setting his shoe on fire.

* * *

**The Beach – Somewhere between the camp and the Bass Convoy**

"Will you quit running a **GET BACK HERE!**" came the incredibly angry yell, as Shannon and Eva continued their hectic chase across the beach.

"Why in th' fuck would I dae tha'?" Shannon called back. The two kept running, Shannon vaulting over rocks and plants as she did with Harold, and Eva going around them, or through the plants.

But, as it does for everyone, Shannon's luck eventually ran out. Her foot caught on a root that blended in with the sand, and she dropped hard. Eva grinned maliciously, and pounced on her. Shannon, expecting such a manoeuvre, pre-emptively rolled to the left, and sprang to her knees, desperately extending her hands out to put some form of barrier between her and the she-devil.

"Wait, wait, wait, look, I'll make ye a deal, just dinnae break anythin'!" Eva glared, and raised her fist

"Get talking." Shannon sprang to her feet, worried expression immediately gone in place of an easy smile

"A'ight, so back hame in Glesga we dae thes thin' wear if ye' piss someain aff, they ge' a free hit on ye' for every time ye' screwed wit' them. Last time I had tae pull thes card were when I explained wae a'body called Ben Grimshaw 'wankstain' tae a bint whae turned oot tae be his nan. I swear tae fuck, th' woman were wearin' less then'-" Shannon was thankfully cut off from going into the story by Eva

"Would you just get to the point?!" Shannon looked at her blankly for a split second, before realisation dawned on her face.

"Ah, right, got ye', got a nasty habit o' runnin' me gob when I get nervoos, which is a lot noo I think aboot i'-" Eva's glare intensified, and Shannon finally started getting to the actual point.

"A'ight, so, in yer' unbiased opinion, hau many times hav' I pissed ye' oaf?". Eva thought for a moment, then simply responded with one word

"Three." Shannon slumped and sighed.

"A'ight then, le's ge' thes over wit' then." She rolled up her left sleeve, and presented it to Eva "Three hits, dinnae hold back, yadda yadda yadda, jis' try nae tae break anythin'"

Eva's frown inverted itself, turning into a slightly malicious grin

"I'll only need one." Eva walked up to Shannon, and sized up the offered arm, before clenching her fist, pulling back her arm, and with a resounding '**WHAM**', let her fist fly into Shannon's forearm. Shannon bent over in pain almost immediately, crying out a series of expletives

"Fuck me tha' hurt! Th' fuck kinda steroids do ye' take?" Eva glared at her again

"Don't push it." Shannon just rolled her visible eye

"Aye, aye, I'll leave ye' alone." Eva stalked off back to the beach, her crates surprisingly close given how long they were running. Shannon stayed behind for a few moments, rubbing her now incredibly sore are, before trudging back to the beach as well.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Well that was a letdown**

Eva: "So, loudmouth can take a punch. I respect that." She inhales sharply through her nose, then continues "I still don't like her, but I respect it"

Shannon: She's rubbing her arm, grimacing in pain "Fuckin' hell tha' girl can punch. Tha' felt like some twat drove his fuckin' second-hand Hyundai wi' th' massive exhaust intae me arm"

* * *

**The Campgrounds**

It took a whole 21 bottles of pop, but the Gophers were finally getting their crates open. Owen was first, slamming his mouth into the top of the crate and sending the top crashing on in. Not noticing the pain he was in nor the bleeding of his gums, he reached in to see what was in his crate

"Hey, check it out: I got wood!" he proudly exclaimed, seemingly unaware of the double entendre he just did. No-one noticed except Cody, who was sniggering to himself, as Trent and Noah literally pulled their crate apart, with the crash resulting in Noah getting covered with some blue tarpaulin.

While his fellow crate destroyer tried to disentangle himself from the aggressive sheet, Trent reached into the rest of the pile to see what he could find

"I've got some tools here." As he finished, Noah finally yanked the sheet off of his head and threw it to the ground "And some pool liner" the Bookworm added with contempt, glaring at the offending item as if daring it to attack him again.

Things were going generally well for the Gophers. Aside from Katie moping, everyone was in fairly high spirits. Heather even apologised to Leshawna for their argument atop the cliff, though it's sincerity was almost instantly disproved in her following conversation with Lindsay, where she revealed her true intentions to keep her friends close and her enemies closer. But this act of deceit went unknown to the rest of the team, as they were far too preoccupied in dealing with the small fire that Adam and Beth had started in their attempts to burn their way through the crate

* * *

15 bottles of pop after the fire had been extinguished, the first of the Killer Bass arrived, which consisted first of Eva and Shannon, Shannon still rubbing her arm, Eva still giving the other girl dirty looks. 3 more bottles of pop later, and 3 more Bass showed up, first Harold and Ezekiel, then Courtney bringing up the rear. Harold dropped his crate with a relieved "Finally" and the 5 Bass were greeted happily by Trent

"Hey, what's up guys?" As Leshawna poked her head out of the crate she was for some reason stood in, Shannon stretched out her back with a series of nasty sounding 'pops', shook off the lingering pain in her arm, and happily strolled on over to Trent

"Aside from the attempts on mah life a few minutes ago, nuttin' much, how's you?" Trent gave the girl a funny look

"What do you mean, 'attempts on your life'?" he asked, eyebrows raised with concern

"Exactly wha' it says on th' tin", nodding her head towards Eva in the process.

"Riiiiiiiight…" he said as he took a subconscious step back from Shannon. After everyone finally noticed Courtney's eye, and some of the least subtle stage whispering I've ever witnessed, the Bass departed to the designated Bass building zone, where the rest of the Bass eventually joined them. Following two attempts at rallying speeches, one from Geoff that was literally a sentence long, and one from Courtney that was more of a political endorsement of herself than anything else, the work began, and the race to build a hot tub was on

* * *

And so began, or at least was edited to begin, a montage of the two teams building things, showcasing the contrast between the leadership skills of Courtney, and the Screaming Gophers apparent tactic of 'winging it and hoping for the best'

As Beth and Justin merrily hammered nails into the already pretty decent looking hot tub, Harold and Geoff haphazardly arranged some planks (most of which were cannibalised from the crates) in the vague shape of a hot tub. It fell over.

As Heather happily handed Trent a hammer so the musician could hammer in yet another seemingly pointless nail, Tyler and Duncan got in a fight over their hammer, a fight which ended with the hammer flying out of both boys' grasp and straight into Harold's crotch. Harold, who was doubled over in pain, was then smacked in the face with a plank of wood as Bridgette lifted it, and then smacked again as she turned around.

As the Gophers formed a bucket relay from the lake to the hot tub that had somehow teleported onto the beach, Courtney was duct taping over any leaks she could find, and wilfully ignoring the way the tape would start bulging mere seconds after it was applied.

* * *

For 20 of the 24 campers, time was being dedicated to last minute touches to the hot tubs, applying seat covers, testing jets, or making sure you weren't likely to get tetanus when you say down in the case of the Bass. 4 of the campers, however, were doing other things.

Katie and Sadie had both snuck away from their teams to be reunited at long last, and were hugging each other and crying about how much they missed the other and all other such stuff behind the cabins where they thought no-one could hear them. Everyone could hear them.

Noah had exhausted himself carrying a plank 2 and a half metres from a box to the hot tub, and was taking a well-deserved break on the Gopher cabin steps. His book was out, but he was not reading, for there was, in his opinion, something far more entertaining than a book he'd read before (albeit a good one) going on a couple of metres in front of him, involving the last camper not working on the hot tub.

'_This ought to be good_' he thought to himself with a smirk as Cody swaggered on over to Gwen, who was knelt down and rooting through a box to find the right kind of spanner. Noah noticed Cody's eyes constantly flickering to and from Gwen's ass, and he quietly chuckled to himself.

* * *

"Hey" said Cody in his 'smoothest' voice, a sly smirk plastered on his face as he took those final few steps that took him into that nebulous distance that is next to someone, someone in this case being Gwen, but you knew that.

Gwen did not respond, instead delving deeper into the crate as she looked for the spanner she was missing and hoped that Cody was talking to someone other than her. But her hopes were in vain, and Cody persisted

"Hey"

"Go away" came the reply from the crate.

"So, you need some help with that? Because I'm pretty good with that construction stuff, if I do say so myself." Within the crate, Gwen grit her teeth, and kept rummaging, and was finally met with success. She grabbed the spanner that was shaped like a heptagon, thus completing the set of spanners shaped like various polygons.

"I said," she began as she got out of the crate, drawing to her full height of not that tall, but certainly taller than Cody, and glared at him "go away"

Cody's face fell for a bit, but completely oblivious to the evident animosity the goth girl bore him, kept on his rapidly derailing train of thinking, started following after her as she stalked off to the nearly completed hot tub, into which Adam had just fallen in while trying to pour in a bucket of water.

"Oh. You sure? I mean, when we're done, we could, y'know, hang out, maybe get to know each other…" Gwen cut him off with a sharp

"Don't make me throw you again." Gwen resumed her walk off, leaving Cody stood there slightly bemused. From the cabin steps, Noah, who had been watching the whole thing with a smirk of amusement, gave his assessment of the situation.

"Well, she didn't assault you, so that's a step up" Cody turned to face the bookworm, a mildly annoyed frown on his face

"I just came at it wrong. I'll just give her a few days to cool off, then try again." Noah shook his head sympathetically

"Yeah, keep going, try hard enough and you might get your very own restraining order."

* * *

That little incident was the last interesting event that happened in the building of the hot tubs, other than the brief sword fight with planks Tyler and Harold got into before Courtney glared at them hard enough for them to feel it.

And thus, soon enough, it was time for judging. The two hot tubs were starkly different in appearance, with the Screaming Gophers' looking like it was actually meant to on the instructions, aside from the scorch marks courtesy of Adam and Beth; contrast with the Killer Bass, whose hot tub looked like the one on the instructions, if the instructions had been drawn by a visually impaired 5-year-old on LSD with access to nothing but melted crayons and burnt matches.

An unusually stern looking Chris was in charge of the judging. He first inspected the attempt of the Screaming Gophers; after looking it over for a few seconds, sticking his finger in to test the temperature, and even sniffing it for whatever reason, he came to a verdict:

"This is an awesome hot tub!" The Gophers cheered at this assessment, chief among them Owen, who jumped out of the hot tub in celebration, apparently having once again lost his bathing suit, to the utter disgust of everyone

But the contest was not over yet, as Chris headed over to the Killer Bass's hot tub to inspect their abstract design, which had gained an occupant in the form of Immobile Seagull. Chris, rather than inspect the hot tub in great detail as he had with the Gophers, simply bent down and gave the thing a light tap. It immediately sprung a leak, spraying the host in the face with water. The tub then gave off a few worrying creaks, before collapsing into its component parts, drenching everyone's shoes and sending Immobile Seagull floating back into the lake on a surge of tepid water.

"Well, I think we have a winner" declared Chris, trying to preserve some form of dramatic tension "The Screaming Gophers!" At this announcement, despite its inevitability, cheers erupted from the Gophers as Chris continued

"Gophers, you're safe from elimination, and you get to rock this awesome hot tub for the rest of the summer! Bonus!" more cheers followed, and then Chris turned to the losers "Killer Bass, what can I say, sucks to be you right now. I'll see your sorry butts at the bonfire tonight"

The Screaming Gophers continued their cheering, with Lindsay happily proclaiming their staying in the contest for another 3 whole days, being group hugged by Beth and Heather, of all people.

"WOOOOOOO! Hahaha! Yes!" yelled Owen from a few feet away, still completely naked. He then began dancing

"We get to staaaaay, we get to staaaaay, we are so awesome, we won the contest!" he sang, punctuating the last line with a bear hug of Lindsay and Heather that left the latter traumatised for life. It was then he noticed Chris leaving

"Hey Chris, what about the pizza you promised us?" Chris turned around to look at Owen, confusion etched onto his face. It took a few moments of thinking to remember his promise

"Oh yeah. Leave your orders with Chef, he'll sort it out." In the kitchen, Chef felt an itch in the back of his skull. He looked out the window in the general direction of the hot tubs, and growled.

* * *

**The Mess Hall, 27 minutes and 34 seconds later**

The atmosphere in the mess hall was tense. Or at least in half of the mess hall it was. Over on the Gopher side of the room, spirits were high; pizza orders had been placed, and friendly conversation was struck up between members. Trent and Cody were in a conversation about chords or something, apparently both were musicians, Lindsay was educating Beth on the differences between cherry red and strawberry red lip gloss; and at the end of the table Justin and Adam sat in what could be called companionable silence from a certain point of view. The only damper on the mood at the table was Katie, who had somewhat recovered from her total breakdown over the loss of her best friend, and instead sat in a faintly morose silence, absent-mindedly tracing patterns on the table with her finger.

However, take a few steps away from the Gopher bench, and the friendly air immediately dissipates, to be replaced with one of uncertainty and bitterness. For over on the Bass table, there was a single thought on everyone's minds: the question of elimination. The silence weighed heavy on all 12 teenagers present, and each reacted to it differently. Well, I say all 12, but Ezekiel was quietly chewing on his wriggling stew, completely oblivious to the tension all around him.

The silence lasted several minutes, until eventually, someone cracked. That someone was Shannon, who threw her arms in the air with an exasperated cry.

"Right, tha's it, I cannae take th' fuckin' silence anymore! Who's up fer' th' choppin' block?" She was met with silence, until Duncan piped up

"Well I'd say you're pretty high up on the list, Cyclops." Shannon turned to face Duncan, raising a finger and opening her mouth to object, when the head of her chicken hat flopped down in front of her face. She looked at it for a bit, before slumping a bit

"Point taken."

"But, if we ever have to lift a truck, you and the brickhouse here are probably our best bet" he continued, jerking his thumb towards DJ as he did so "Which if you ask me, leaves Tweedleidiot and Miss C-I-T over here"

Sadie was both too morose to mount a reasonable defence, and also too sat at the other end of the table to even hear what was being said, so naturally, she said nothing, continuing to trace patterns on the table just like her BFFFL, which is starting to veer into creepy territory. Unlike Sadie, Courtney was sat right next to Duncan, and could use her many studies of law to mount a brilliant defence of her case

"What?! Why?" she exclaimed, standing up in shock. So much for those hundred-dollar law textbooks.

"Because, unless I'm mistaken, you two are the only ones with chicken hats and nothing to show for it"

"But you guys need me, I'm the only one-"

"We know" Bridgette cut in; even she was getting sick of that "you used to be a real CIT; so who would you pick?" Courtney's eyes darted around the room frantically, completely missing her monochrome-striped salvation at the other end of the table. Instead, her gaze focussed on Tyler, of all people.

"What about him?" Tyler, who was in the middle of a mouthful of mush, looked up in surprise, almost choking on his 'meal' as the finger of blame was pointed at him. Before he could finish chewing and swallow, however, there was an interruption from the other end of the dining hall entirely.

"NOOOOO!" yelled Lindsay, jumping to her feet dramatically, provoking confused stares from just about everyone. She quickly realised that everyone was looking at her, and tried to cover her outburst.

"Uh, I mean, there's no… salt. There's no salt on the table." The room was silent for several seconds, until the _'slap'_ of Noah facepalming echoed throughout the room, and everyone went back to their business as Lindsay sat down awkwardly.

Duncan's only reaction to this scene was to smirk at Courtney

"Nice try, but I don't see a chicken hat on him, do you?" Courtney wasn't backing down though

"Oh come on, look at him, he's useless!" Tyler, who had by this point finished his mouthful, was actually prepared to defend himself.

"Hey!" he said as he spun around on his chair "What make you think I'm so- **WOOOAAH GOD**!" That last part happened as Tyler spun around on his chair too fast, slipped off his seat and crashed onto the floor, groaning in pain. Now it was Courtney's turn to smirk

"See? Useless" Duncan leant over the table to look at Tyler sprawled on the floor

"Yeah, I'm not buying it" He turned to look at Courtney and shrugged "So unless there's someone else you can throw under the bus, I think it's pretty obvious whose going home"

It was at this point Courtney started to internally panic. Her eyes darted across her teammates, trying to find someone who she could reasonably offer up for eliminations. As she scanned each member in turn, the panic set in deeper. Harold? He looked useless but he actually jumped off the cliff. DJ and Shannon both chickened out, but they could likely bench press Courtney if they so choose. Izzy? Who knew what that psycho could do? As she continued down the line, she grew more and more worried, until eventually, she finally saw her salvation.

"Okay, well what about her?" her arm raised, and she pointed straight at Sadie, who everyone had just sorta forgotten about. Sadie looked around in panic, but the biggest protest would not come from the Bass table.

"**NOOOOOO!**" came the reactionary yell from Katie, in a repeat of history from just 2 minutes ago. Again, there was silence following this announcement, and again the silence was broken by Noah, who this time sighed and slammed his head on the table with a loud 'THUD', having now had both of his ears screamed in over the course of one meal. Over at the Bass table, however, there was no such opposition.

"Weel, 'at werks fer me" said Shannon as she stood up, dumped the rest of her food in the bin, and headed out of the dining hall. Everyone else on soon followed, the Gophers leaving too to go sort out pizza.

Eventually, the only two campers left in the mess hall were Duncan and Courtney. Now words were exchanged, and Duncan just smirked at the girl before strolling on out leisurely.

* * *

**The Campfire – 3 hours, 48 minutes and 33 seconds later (or about 1,959 bottles of pop for those curious)**

The evening was cool. The fire was crackling. The woodland beasts were being noisy little shits. The Killer Bass were assembled, ready to face the historic first campfire ceremony. Before them stood Chris, looking rather stern.

"Killer Bass, at camp marshmallows represent a tasty treat that you enjoy roasting by the fire" Chris said, gesturing all the time to a tray of 11 marshmallows "At this camp, marshmallows represent life."

There was a pause in Chris's monologue, long enough for Geoff to mime himself being hung, then tip his hat a Bridgette. The surfer girl giggled as Duncan rolled his eyes next to her. Chris went on

"You have all cast your votes and made your decision. There are only eleven marshmallows on this plate. When I call your name, come up, and claim your marshmallow. The camper who does not receive a marshmallow tonight must immediately return to the Dock of Shame, to catch the Boat of Losers. That means, you're out of the contest. And you can't come back. Ever." The amount of denial in Chris's voice was suspect, but that's neither here nor there.

"The first marshmallow goes to…

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…

"Geoff." Geoff smiled, and ran up to Chris to claim his marshmallow, and attention went back to Chris as he announced the next person safe.

"The second marshmallow goes to…

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…

…

"Tyler"

"WOO-HOO-HOO, YEAH! Place at the table" Tyler yelled rather enthusiastically as he went to join Geoff. At this point, Chris started calling off names a lot quicker.

"Bridgette!" The Surfer gave off a relieved sigh as she went to get her marshmallow

"DJ!" He too sighed in relief, and walked up to Chris with a relieved smile on his face

"Ezekiel!" Ezekiel let out a small "whoop!" as he got up

"Harold!" Harold fistpumped and let out a quiet "yes!"

"Izzy!" Izzy cackled, and grabbed her marshmallow as fast as she could, eating it (and the stick it was speared on) in a single bite

"Duncan!" Duncan gave his trademark smirk, and sauntered over to receive his marshmallow

"Eva!"

"Damn right!" came the response as Eva marched up

"Shannon!"

"Can I take the stupid hat off now?" asked Shannon

"No" came the immediate response from Chris. Shannon sighed and got up to join the 9 other safe members of her team, and then there were 2.

"Campers, this is the final marshmallow of the evening" in the final cut of the program, the dramatic cuts between the increasingly worried Courtney and the increasingly despondent Sadie went on for a full 34 seconds. It is presented here in its condensed form for your reading convenience

"The final marshmallow of the evening goes to…"

* * *

**Confession Cam – Well isn't this dramatic?**

Geoff: "Man, I don't wanna vote for anyone: they're all cool in their own way. But if I had to pick, I'd say Courtney. She really needs to chill"

Tyler: "I'm voting for Sadie. She really wasn't much of a team player"

Bridgette: "Ugh, I know Sadie didn't help the team, but I feel like sending her even further away from her friend is gonna make things worse for her. So I'm voting for Courtney"

DJ: "Aw man, having to vote someone off on the first day really sucks." He sighs to himself "I'm voting for Courtney"

Ezekiel: "I'm vo'oting for Sadie, eh."

Harold: "I can just tell that Duncan is going to be the exact type of idiot who does things like glue my comic books together for kicks. So I vote for him"

Izzy: "Sadie." She sits with her arms folded for a second, then begins trying to climb out of the small hole in the door. By some miracle, she succeeds.

Eva: "Loudmouth may be _really_ annoying, but at least she can back it up. Courtney, on the other hand?"

Shannon: "As much as ye cannae jus' split up Ant and Dec, Dec didnae even try. So, there's me vote."

* * *

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"Courtney" The CIT let out a huge sigh of relief and practically bounded over to Chris, who was busy addressing Sadie.

"Can't say I'm shocked. You spent most of the day moping." He walked over to Sadie, and gave an extravagant arm gesture pointing in the direction of the dock "Dock of Shame is that way"

Still sniffling, Sadie got up and trudged to the Boat of Losers. Once she was out of earshot, Chris turned to the rest of the Killer Bass

"The rest of you, enjoy your marshmallows, you're safe. For tonight" the dramatic tension was immediately undercut by a question:

"_Now_ can we take the stupid hats off?" from Shannon.

"Ugh, _fine_" Chris said as he gave in, clearly put out over having his moment ruined

* * *

**Confession Cam – 1 down, 22 to go**

Duncan: he laughs to himself "I was never actually gonna vote for Courtney, not while Tweedleidiot's around. But girls like her are so fun to mess with"

* * *

**Back at the hot tub**

The pizzas were in. The hot tub was hot. The 'cool' kids of Trent, Lindsay, Heather and Justin had commandeered the hot tub, and also Cody had snuck in there too; said Tech Geek was leading the team in a toast, only using a juice box instead of alcohol because he's 16 and trans-Atlantic drinking laws are dumb.

"To the Screaming Gophers!" he proclaimed. His toast was well received by his fellow hot tub occupants, and was followed with a chorus of "Woos". A few feet in front of the hot tub, Leshawna was dancing around and chanting "Go Gophers!" She was soon joined by Noah and (a thankfully fully clothed) Owen. The positions and demeanours of the other Gophers varied; Gwen had a small smile on her face as she leant on the hot tub, Beth was sat on the stairs of the cabin happily joining in the chant; next to her was Adam, smiling despite the nervousness visible in his eyes as he continued writing in his notebook; finally Katie was crying next to the hot tub as she dreaded the return of the Bass sans Katie.

And return the Bass did, trudging miserably by the hot tub as the Gophers' pizza arrived, Chef having gotten sick of the Second Pizza War and just ordered everything he heard and billed the producers. As the Bass continued their forlorn march, Katie noticed the absence of Sadie in their numbers, and broke down in tears. This immediately put a massive damper on the mood of the celebration, as one might expect, as most of the Gophers just sort of looked at her awkwardly, with only Beth going to try and comfort her.

Meanwhile, Courtney spotted a camera and turned to it

"Are you recording this? Good. They can enjoy their little party all they want. But I am gonna win this competition, and no-one is gonna stop me!"

* * *

**Confession Cam – Them be fighting words**

Gwen: "Yep, this camp pretty much still sucks." she pauses for a moment and shrugs "But, now that I'm here, I guess I might as well try to actually win"

Shannon: "Well, today coulda gone a wee bit better. Ah well, there's always tomorrow."

Ezekiel: "I doon't know why, but I feel like today should've gone really badly"

Heather: She sits smirking, her arms folded. "Just wait, these losers aren't gonna know what hit them"

Adam: He waves at the camera, smiling for once. "Hi mom, I made it!" he stops smiling, and adjusts his glasses "Everyone here seems nice enough. Except Heather, she keeps glaring at me."

Noah: He groans, and holds his head in his hands. "I'm surrounded by crazy people"

* * *

**That's right all you imaginary people I pretend like this story to mantain my fragile self-esteem, we are back, after over a month of absence! I have really terrible work ethic. I was meant to be doing uni work while editing this.**

**In all honestly, I'm kinda unhappy with chapter 1 on reflection, I feel like I leant to hard on just "transcribe the episode with narrator commentary". Tried to break away from that, but it's a process. Next chapter _should_ be better with regards to that. Probably gonna rewrite that one at some point.  
**

**But anyways, please, if you read this, leave a review, let me know what you think, or make a joke, or just leave a single lowercase 'e', anything helps, I'm very new to all this.**


	3. Sleep Now in the (Camp)Fire

**THE FOLLOWING IS A NONPROFIT FAN-BASED WORK OF FICTION  
****THE TOTAL DRAMA FRANCHISE IS OWNED BY FRESH TV, TELETOON, JENNIFER PERTSCH AND TOM MCGILLIS  
****PLEASE SUPPORT THE OFFICIAL RELEASE**

**Review Response (Because I can do that now):**

**Gucci Mane LaFlare: **Shannon's accent is mostly done through sounding out her dialogue in my head, then trying my best to recreate those words phonetically. Having a distinct voice for her really helps (In this case, that of Cammie McCloud from gen:LOCK). Scottish People Twitter on reddit helped with some of it also. As for Ezekiel, well, uh, can't really say much without spoiling, but read on I suppose

**Guest: **The romance in this isn't 100% planned out, there's like one relationship that's set in stone throughout this, the rest is all vaguely nebulous ideas in my head. I never really had an idea for Ezekiel at first, but I do now and that's all I can say.

Random tangent, but is it just me or are the relationship names in Total Drama really bloody boring? Just slap their names together in a vaguely pronounceable way and call it a day. I dunno, maybe it's just because my first real experience with fan culture was RWBY, and they have a spreadsheet with all the different puns for each ship.

**Content Warning:** Is this necessary anymore? Well, there's 12 fucks, 3 shits, and 1 bastard, in case you were wondering.

* * *

It was a (relatively) beautiful morning on the Island. Birds twittered in the trees as the morning dew on the grass glistened. A few days had passed since the 23 teenagers had been made to jump off of a cliff and perform manual labour, and they were finally settling into the rhythm of Wawanakwa, with the awful food and the cameras everywhere and the 22 other freaks they were stuck with

That rhythm was to be broken as an overly egotistical man marched proudly over to the cabins, produced a megaphone from one pocket, an airhorn from another; and blew the airhorn into the megaphone, creating a sound of such volume that the sheer impact would have toppled a tree had one been positioned directly in front of it.

There was, however, no tree to be toppled, but the birds stopped twittering and looked up from their phones, the dew was blasted off the grass in a 15ft radius around the megaphone, and the 23 sleeping teenagers were rendered very awake.

The worst casualty amongst the startled wakeups of the campers was Leshawna, who smacked her head on the bunk above her as she bolted upright. Recovering quickly, she dashed over to the window to go yell at Chris.

"**Ow**! It's 7 in the morning, do I _look_ like a farmer to you?" Leshawna's yell attracted the attention of the two farmers in the group, Ezekiel and Beth, both of whom had been awake for at least an hour already due to being on freaky farm time.

"What did I do, eh?" Came the cry of indignation from the Bass cabin. No-one paid Ezekiel any notice as Chris put down the airhorn and began yelling into the megaphone, thereby completely invalidating the point of a megaphone.

"You have ten minutes to get dressed and get out here; anyone not here automatically loses the challenge!" Despite the tiredness of the vast majority of the campers, as mass scramble ensued to get dressed in the allotted time. Highlights of said scramble include Harold wearing a shirt full of mayonnaise courtesy of Duncan, Cody getting distracted by the sight of Gwen in her pyjamas and running into a post, Tyler managing to fall over with every piece of clothing he put on, and an alarm clock going off which Eva punched through a wall.

But despite the injures and condiment spillage, 9 minutes and 34 seconds later all the campers were assembled in front of the cabins, looking incredibly worse for the wear: almost everyone was yawning with bags under their eyes, it was enough to make even Justin look bad (I am resoundingly heterosexual); in fact the only people who looked remotely okay were Eva, who refused to show any sort of weakness and was at that moment in time growling at Cody, who had attempted to mess with her MP3 player; Ezekiel and Beth, likely due to their aforementioned freaky farm hours; Heather, who just seemed unfazed by the lack of sleep; and for whatever reason Adam, who stood away from the group fidgeting nervously as per usual. Almost all of the campers were still too tired to talk, the exception being Shannon, who was swearing profusely as she tried to sort out her hair, which during the night had messed up enough to cover both of her eyes. With a final mutter of "fuck fucking fuck", she tossed the right-hand side of her fringe back and finally made it stay there, just as Chris Maclean strolled proudly over to the campers.

"Morning! Hope you slept well!" the response to the host's cheery greeting was a series of very disgruntled murmurs, some whispered threats from Gwen, and an overly cheery "Hi Chris!" from Heather, who was evidently looking to suck up; "You look really buff in those shorts"

Chris's response was an "I know", accompanied by finger guns and a wink neither of which I even wanna consider the implications of seeing as he is almost _twice the age of everyone else there_. Moving on from the questionable I-don't-want-to-call-it-flirting, Chris began walking down the line again.

"Okay, I hope you're all ready because your next challenge begins in exactly one minute" Chris said as he stopped his walk at Owen to check his watch. Speaking of Owen, it was he who spoke up next

"Oh, excuse me! I don't know if that's enough time to eat breakfast"

"Oho you'll get breakfast Owen", said Chris in an incredibly sinister tone "Right after you complete your 20-kilometre run around the lake!"

This provoked a mixed response from the campers. Several depressed slumps, a few exaggerated sighs, a couple of indifferences, and an angry rant from Eva

"Oh, so you're funny now?" She began marching at Chris, fists raised menacingly "You know what _I_ think would be funny, shoving that megaphone up your-" Eva's string of violent imagery was thankfully ended before it could begin by Geoff and Duncan holding her back, while Courtney stage-whispered "Eva! Try to control your temper."

After a second of consideration, Eva elected to give Courtney no verbal response, and instead her head snapped back to Chris

"You're enjoying this aren't you?"

"A little." Chris replied with his arms clasped confidently behind his back. He then gestured to his watch, again "you have thirty seconds"

* * *

**Confession Cam – Why did **_**I**_** have to wake up at 7?**

Courtney: "Okay, that girl, Eva, has got to get a hold on her temper. She's only been here three days and she's already thrown her suitcase through a window, broke a lock on one of the bathroom doors…"

Geoff: "Man, Eva really needs to learn to chill. Just relax brah, life ain't all about winning. It's about the good times between the wins"

Courtney: "… almost got in another fist fight with Shannon, broke three pairs of Harold's glasses, dented the dining table…"

Shannon: "Am I tae blame for the Bridge Troll bein' so pissed off? Aye, probably. I have a tendency tae rub people th' wrong way when I first meet 'em. Am I gointae talk tae her aboot it? Fuck no, that girl could snap a man's bones like a twig!"

Courtney: "… and just this morning, she punched my alarm clock through a wall!"

Eva: she sits in the confessional, scowling at the camera with her arms folded "So what? I have a temper. You got a problem with that?"

* * *

After an undetermined amount of time, the campers were lined up on the unmarked starting line, all arrayed in various poses, ranging from the serious runner's crouches of Tyler and DJ, to the borderline comical backwards leg of Trent, and the 'standing there' of Heather. Chris was, of course, on hand to melodramatically announce everything

"Okay runners! On your marks, get set… GO!" And so they were off, charging out into the woods in almost perfect unison. Except for Tyler, who immediately tripped on an untied shoelace and fell down hard. But he recovered quickly, chasing after the others in an awkward looking jog with his back bent forwards and his arms hanging limply from his sides. I guess he isn't a running jock.

* * *

The sun beating down overhead was brutal, with no cloud coverage whatsoever to prevent the scorching heat singe the backs of necks or burn exposed shoulders. Although all the campers had started off running, it didn't take long for several of them to slow to a leisurely walk, some falling into step to talk among themselves. One such group was the very odd couple of Harold and Gwen. At least it was on Harold's end

"Do you know how much longer?" He received no reply, and was met only with the hurried footsteps and panting breaths of Justin and Bridgette, who were in the process of overtaking them. Once they were gone, however, he got an actual response from the goth

"Don't walk beside me." Well. So much for that conversation.

Instead, then, we move to a different part of the woods, where Heather has been bumped by a passing Ezekiel

* * *

**Confession Cam – Boy am I glad to be not them**

Heather: "I don't run. And I _definitely_ don't run in high-heel wedges"

* * *

Heather's irritated stomp through the woods was brought to a sudden halt when she came across Owen, who was on his hands and knees, desperately lapping at a puddle that contained multiple leaves, several sticks, and a duck, who looked rather irritated at having his home drank. As he drank, he began rambling to himself in-between slurps.

"Can't" _slurp_ "catch" _slurp_ "breath, must" _slurp_ "have condition!" as he reach the end of his sentence, his voice trailed off into the upper echelons of pitch, and his arms gave out, sending him splashing into the puddle, angering the duck even further, who gave Owen what I must assume was a rude gesture with his wing, before flying off. Heather, meanwhile, was equally unsympathetic

"Yeah, it's called overeating" she snapped, hands on her hips "look into it." Such comments were unappreciated by the passing Leshawna, who took a break from running to lean against a tree in order to both catch her breath and mouth off Heather

"And what's your excuse, you skinny, annoying…" she trailed off as her lack of breath caught up with her "Hoo. I'm too tired for insults."

Any potential retorts from Heather were cut off by the appearance of Chris, who had decided to drive by on a quad bike to yell at the campers some more.

"Pick it up people! If you're not back by dinner time, you don't eat!" Normally, the threat of withholding food is a significant one, enough to motivate people to put in some effort. But when the cooking comes from a man of such culinary talents as Chef Hatchet, then the motivational effect is significantly diminished. As a result, the only people who responded to this call were Owen, who hauled himself out of the puddle and staggered off in the general direction of the mess hall; Shannon, who accelerated from 'leisurely stroll' to 'brisk walk'; and Noah, who actively slowed down to a gentle walk.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Throw enough spice on and anything's edible if you ask me**

Noah: "Our first challenge was jumping off a cliff into shark-infested waters, there's no way our second is gonna be _running_. Besides, starving is preferable to the stuff they serve here."

* * *

And now, an overview of the contestants' positions at the midpoint of the race, provided to me by this handy digital map you lot can't see, because visuals weren't in the budget.

In the front of the pack, to no-one's surprise, is Eva, with a substantial lead over those behind her. The closest to her are the group of Duncan, Geoff and DJ, moving as a trio it seems. Further down we find the first Gopher of the pack, that being Justin, whose glorious modelling muscles aren't just for show (not a word out of any of you), and he is followed by Courtney, and right behind her is Bridgette.

More Gophers follow now, with Beth and Lindsay moving together as a duo, and Leshawna having hit her second wind and begun slowly catching up to them. Ezekiel comes next, followed by Izzy, and then Trent, who makes up the last of those running the race.

Up next are those walking, and leading the pack is Shannon, followed closely by Adam and Cody, having as much of a conversation as you can when one participant is practically mute. After them is Heather and Gwen, the two occasionally sniping at each other only with words and not bullets.

Wait, I forgot a runner, Tyler technically counts, but he keeps tripping over tree roots and running into tree branches, so he's not making very good pace. Katie is next, trudging along due to sadness about her missing friend. Noah has stopped, apparently having collapsed despite doing no more than _walking_ and Owen has also stopped in order to pick him up, despite his own lack of fitness.

And bringing up the rear is Harold, who keeps having to stop to take a breather every 3 and a half steps.

* * *

**The Mess Hall – 22 minutes later**

By this point, most of the campers had arrived in the Mess Hall, in various states of exhaustion, and were sat around their teams' tables. The only ones missing were Noah, Harold, Owen, and Leshawna, who had run out of second wind and dropped down the standings significantly.

All those present in the mess hall looked up from what they were doing when the door slammed open, and Owen barged in, Noah slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes

**"CLEAR A TABLE, STAT!"** he yelled as he ran over to said table, upon which he laid out Noah and began performing chest compressions. Leshawna staggered in a few seconds behind, and dropped to the floor in exhaustion, cheering about having finally made it in her slightly delirious state.

And finally, in walked Harold, clutching his chest and leaning on the door frame, wheezing even heavier than usual.

"What took you so long?" asked Courtney as Harold began convulsing in a very worrying manner "We just lost the challenge!" clearly, Courtney's priorities are in entirely the right order.

"I think I'm having heart palpitations" Harold replied as he began doubling over. The Bass began muttering in disappointment as Harold collapsed on the ground, and over on the Gopher side of the hall, attention was still on the still-unmoving Noah. Until Gwen began pondering.

"Hey wait a minute…" she began. Behind her, Owen had decided he'd given enough chest compressions and prepared to give Noah mouth-to-mouth. As Owen's head began its descent, Noah's eyes shot open and he slapped his hand over Owen's mouth. Gwen ignored this and continued her train of thought

"If they lost, that means we won the challenge!" she proclaimed. Noah rolled his eyes at such spectacular deductive skills, but the rest of the Gophers began cheering heartily, happy at having escaped elimination yet ag-

"Whoa there, hold your horses guys!" said Chris "That wasn't the challenge!"

"What did you just say?" asked Gwen, abject fear plastered on her face. Chris chose not to answer her directly, instead walking over to the giant curtain at the bottom end of the hall no-one had noticed or questioned until that point.

"Who's hungry!" he declared as the curtains swung back to reveal a table laden with actual food, as opposed to the increasingly twitchy slop they'd been fed over the past few days. There were several turkeys, bowls full of mashed potatoes, a veritable navy of gravy boats, a baker's worth of bread rolls, and it was all so very like something you'd have for Sunday lunch rather than breakfast at half 7 in the morning. For some inexplicable reason, it was glowing and sparkling like it was in an infomercial or something

* * *

**Confession Cam – Fuck, now I'm hungry**

Gwen: "After days of nothing but brown sludge, I almost cried when I saw that buffet"

Owen: "And then I saw it! The buffet table! It was _beautiful_! There was turkey, and enamel bars and baked beans and maple syrup!" his eyes shut and begins sniffling. "Can I have a minute?" he then starts crying about the food.

Noah: "So the food turned out to be actually good. I was still right about the challenge. I'll take being half right over all wrong"

* * *

**35 minutes later**

It turned out the buffet was for everyone, not just the Gophers, and sure enough all the campers had eaten to their hearts content, which naturally meant half the table was devoured by Owen alone. The teens were all in various states of exhaustion, slumped against walls and each other groaning from how full they were.

"Ahh, I haven't eaten like that since that meal with the Native Americans!" Izzy said to no-one in particular. Noah, who was sat next to her, raised an eyebrow

"That was not eating. What you did in there was pure chaos"

Suddenly, from behind the curtain, Chris leapt onto the table, megaphone back in hand, and started yelling into it again

"Okay campers, time for part 2 of your challenge!" the groans of full bellies turned into groans of great annoyance, with a faint "called it" from Noah being heard amongst the chorus.

"I thought eating was the second part" said Owen, still eating

"What more do you want from us?" asked Gwen, who had apparently consumed enough food to form a noticeable bump in her stomach. And it seemed Heather was in agreement with Gwen, as unlikely as it may seem

"Weird Goth Girl is right," that got a glare from Gwen, which Heather ignored "haven't we been through enough?"

"Hmm, let me think about that" replied Chris, scratching his chin in thought "No!"

"It's time for…" from seemingly nowhere, a dramatic fanfare began as Chris announced, "The Awake-A-Thon!"

"The What-A-Thon?" asked Owen, removing a lot of the dramatic tension

"Don't worry" said Chris as he jumped down off of the table and brought the megaphone to bear against Owen's face "This is an easy one. The team with the last camper standing wins invincibility."

"So," Gwen began "What you're saying is the 20k run, and the turkey eating frenzy, were all part of your evil plan to make it harder for us to stay awake?"

"That's right, Gwen!"

"Man, he's good." Silence followed this last question, as the teens let the news of their next task wash over them. Chris wasn't having any of it.

"Move, move move!" he yelled at them, turning up the volume on his megaphone as he did so. The campers all began their forlorn march outside. Except for Trent, who stopped to talk to Gwen

"So, how long do you think it'll be before everyone's out cold?" he asked, still clutching his stomach as if to stop its contents bursting out. Gwen did some quick mental maths, and replied

"About an hour, give or take." She then noticed Owen walking by, panting like a dog and with shoulders slumped, and she quickly amended this estimate "Maybe less"

* * *

**The Campfire Pit – 3 hours later**

The weather in Muskoka had sure picked a hell of a day to be brutal. The sunlight hadn't abated in its baking of the ground below since it had scorched the backs of necks several hours earlier, and now its rays continued beating down on the campers below, assaulting them alongside the inexorably creeping exhaustion that seeped into their minds.

The campers were split into their teams, with the Gophers occupying the west side of the campfire pit, and the Bass occupying the east, with a large no-man's land in-between that no-one dared cross. The campsite was dotted with various logs of differing shapes and sizes that served as chairs, some being the stumpy remains of once proud trees, others being long logs laid on their sides to form a makeshift bench.

The clock that would be edited into the top corner of the screen read 3:02:27, but none of the teenagers knew that. For them, time was no more than a vague notion, something that was clearly passing, but no-one knew by how much. Ask one person and they might say 2 hours, someone else may say 10. The only one with even the slightest idea was Harold, who had learned how to tell the time using the position of the sun in the sky. He had tried explaining this skill in great detail to the rest of his team, but after 20 seconds everyone except Ezekiel had tuned him out.

"The oldest known hour sundial dates back to the reign of the Pharaoh Thutmoses III, who ruled Egypt in around 1500 BC. It was an L-shaped stone with lines scored along its upper face. When aligned to the sun…" Harold hadn't actually got to the part where you learn how to actually tell the time with the sun, he was still on the history of solar timekeeping as a whole, and had just recently finished the part on the Byzantine sundial-calendar. Somehow, Ezekiel was able to keep listening to this lecture that had been going on for twenty minutes now, and hadn't shown the first signs of falling asleep. If anything, he was actually paying attention.

* * *

**Confession Cam – That lecture is making me want to become history**

Ezekiel: "Haroold's the only one here who's really talked to me." He scratches his chin in thought "Shoore, a lot of what he says makes no sense, but at least he seems to like me, eh"

* * *

As Harold continued yammering, the rest of his team were forced to find other things to do in order to not get bored to sleep. Most struck up conversations with those sat near them, some procured forms of entertainments such as books from pockets, and others simply kept themselves occupied with their own thoughts. The Gophers were doing much the same, and so time marched inexorably onwards.

* * *

**8:23:32:44 into the Awake-A-Thon**

As the clock ticked by, the campers were starting to show signs of fatigue, bags beginning to form under their eyes, despite having only been awake for about ten hours, a perfectly reasonable amount of time to be awake for. Eh, teenagers, their body clocks are all out of whack.

Bearing the brunt of this fatigue seemed to be Gwen, who I would have pegged for the type to be primarily nocturnal, but then again nocturnal creatures do get to sleep in the day.

"This is the most boring thing I have ever done in my life" she lamented as she slumped, fighting back yawns with every word

"Could be way worse" said Trent, who was sat next to her, as he too fought back yawns. Gwen looked at him and cocked a confused eyebrow

"Oh yeah? How?"

"I could be stuck here without you to talk to." Pretty smooth there guy. Gwen seemed to think so to, a small smile coming to her face for the first time in several days, and the faintest hints of a blush made their way to her cheeks.

From the main Gopher conglomeration, Heather noticed this, her eyes narrowing as she watched this new bond form. Filing the information away for later, like some sort of villainous secretary, she resumed her own plots to get ahead in the competition

* * *

**Confession Cam – My school secretary once lit me on fire, so if you ask me most secretaries are pretty villainous**

Heather: "So, my strategy is to get two other campers to form an alliance with me and take to the final three. The question is, who can I find who is either desperate or dumb enough to do whatever I say?"

* * *

As if on a mission to prove that karma is little more than a concept goody two-shoes use to make themselves feel better, the universe then decided to provide Heather with the exact answer to her question.

The answer was Lindsay, who was for whatever reason trying to do a headstand.

"What are you doing?" asked Gwen incredulously, apparently just as confused as I am

"Trying to get the blood to rush to my head" Lindsay replied as she tried to find her centre of balance, once she succeeded, she looked in Gwen's general direction and smiled "I think it's working!"

I'm not even going to comment. However, it appears that Beth was, for a certain degree of 'comment' at least

"Can I try?" she asked with her hands clasped eagerly, sounding far too enthusiastic to experience a potential brain haemorrhage. Lindsay gave an enthusiastic "Sure!" in response, and Beth merrily flipped herself over and tried to fine her own centre of balance next to Lindsay.

A metre or so away, Heather witnessed all of this, and smirked in glee, muttering a quiet "perfect" to herself.

"Lindsay! Beth!" Heather called from behind the other campers. Both girls tried awkwardly to look in her direction, almost losing their balance in the process "Can I talk to you for a sec?"

"Sure!" they both replied happily, not noticing the downright predatory grin that had formed on Heather's face at their answer. The two girls turned themselves the right way around, waited a few seconds to regain their ability to see as their blood returned to its normal position, and the two of them followed Heather to the spot behind the bushes where they were being led.

Once the three girls made it into the clearing, Heather turned to the other two with a confident smile, arms folded across her chest

"Okay, I have a plan to get me and two other people into the final three, and I chose you guys"

Showing an incredible lack of survival instinct, both girls' reactions was very positive. They both smiled, and Lindsay let out an excited "Really!?"

"You should know that this is a very big deal," Heather continued "I am placing my trust in you, and trust is a two-way street." The other girls began nodding eagerly

"So you'll do everything I say then?" despite the menace in those words, the response remained positive, Lindsay exclaiming her third "Sure!" in as many minutes. She then turned to Beth and began squealing

"We're going to the final three!" Beth got the memo and both girls began squealing excitedly

"EEEEEEEEEEEE!" It was then that Heather's smirk dropped, as she realised the price she had to pay for easily manipulated lackeys

* * *

**Confession Cam – Oh for god's sake I thought the squealing was over when Sadie left**

Beth: "I can't believe it! Heather is taking _me_ to the final three! I'm going to the final three! I'm going to the final three!" she finally breaks out of her joyous celebration to clasp her hand together in thought "I wonder what will happen then?"

* * *

"Speaking of alliances," said Lindsay as she walked next to Beth and turned her gaze to the other campers "you know who I think is reeeally cute…?" she directed Beth's view towards the Bass side of camp, zooming in on Tyler, who was lounging against one of the less rotted log stump seats, and faring far better in terms of exhaustion that most of his campmates.

"Oh no" cut in Heather, imposing herself in-between Lindsay and her view of the jock. "No no no. You can't date him"

"Why not?" came the confused reply

"Because he's on the other team!" Heather said like it was obvious. Which it sort of was, but not to Lindsay. Not that Heather's explanation helped anything, as Lindsay seemed more confused if anything

"Uh-huh?"

"You can't inter-team date, it's like" she paused for a split-second, trying to come up with something "against the alliance rules." Nailed it

"There are rules?" came the synchronised response of Beth and Lindsay. Heather looked taken aback for a moment, but quickly regained her composure

"Remember what I said about trust, Lindsay? Of course, you could always leave the alliance. If you do though, I can't protect you from getting kicked off."

"No, I wanna be in the alliance!" Lindsay replied, scared of the concept of being left to fend for herself

"Good" said Heather, face shifting back to the smug smirk it usually wore "Then it's settled". And with that, she walked off.

Lindsay slumped in sadness for a bit, then looked back up at the red-clad object of her affection. He happened to notice her gaze, and he waved friendlily at her. Lindsay perked right back up, and waved back, bouncing eagerly in place, which happened to make Tyler very pleased with how everything was going for him right then.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Lucky bastard**

Lindsay: "Heather said I couldn't date him. She never said I couldn't like him"

Tyler: "Oh yeah baby, it's Tyler time!" he yells, fist pumping incessantly. Eventually, he fist pumps too hard, and falls over, crashing to the ground. A few seconds pass, and then his upraised fist is visible, accompanied by a "Woo!"

* * *

**11:59:48**

Time continued its passage, and soon enough almost half a day had passed. The bags under the camper's eyes, which had finally faded around the 9-hour mark, had fully returned, making it seem as though the teens had been awake for far longer than they actually had.

By this point in time, most of the campers were sat down, either attempting to converse with each other, or simply focussing desperately on staying awake. The exceptions to this were Courtney, who was jogging in place to try and keep herself awake; and Owen, who was doing a strange kind of shuffle around the Gopher encampment, his eyes wide with manic determination and a crazed grin on his face.

From somewhere unknown to all, even me, Chris began whispering dramatic narration as if it were a nature documentary

"We are now twelve hours in with all twenty-three campers still wide awake." Some of the campers looked up in curiosity to find the source of this voice, to no avail; while others ignored it and tried to stay focussed on anything that would keep them awake. But the biggest reaction came from Owen.

"WOO-HOO! Stay awake for twelve hours? I could do that in my sleep!" he yelled, snapping several of his teammates out of their reveries on drawing their attention to him. He stopped shuffling in order to triumphantly raise his fist in the air, and let out another "WOO-HOO!"

He then froze in place for a second, and collapsed backwards, expression unchanging until he hit the ground. He landed with a very loud '**THUMP**', and started snoring, completely out for the count.

One down, 22 to go.

* * *

**13:12:56**

Above the campers, the sky burned a bright orange, as the sun took its final steps below the horizon. And beneath that blazing sky, the campers continued with their struggle against the ever-encroaching inky blackness of sleep.

The sound of a book slamming shut echoed across the Gopher encampment, accompanied by a long sigh, as Noah leant back against a large log in frustration. From the other end of the log, Cody stopped cloudgazing and looked over to him

"Finished?" he asked.

"For the third time. If I read this thing once more I'm going to start talking in ambiguous prose" he replied, not looking over to Cody. "Ugh, I'm going to have to start talking to people, aren't I?" Cody shot him a smirk

"Looks like it." Noah sighed again.

"Fine" He lamented. There was silence for about ten seconds, before Noah spoke up again. "So what do we talk about?"

Cody shrugged. "Dunno. What book were you reading?"

"Heart of Darkness"

"Any good?"

Noah held the book up in one hand, inspecting it briefly, before dropping it dismissively. "Meh" was his ultimate opinion. Silence fell on the boys, lasting another twenty seconds, before Noah groaned in frustration

"Ugh dammit, surely between you, me, and" he gestured towards Adam, who was playing solitaire just to the pair's right "the king of games over here, we can come up with something to talk about"

"I don't think he talks" said Cody. Adam, who had looked up upon being mentioned, tried to speak up in his defence, but all that came out was the syllable "ahc", and a series of choking noises

"So" Cody spoke up again, "anyone got anything we can do?". Noah shrugged, while Adam looked to his half-finished game of solitaire. And something within him stirred. Maybe it was some newfound courage. Maybe it was a sense that he could actually get along with these people. Or maybe it was just sleepless delirium

"Wasn't gonna finish anyway" he murmured to himself as he shuffled his game of solitaire back into a neat pile with surprising dexterity, and shuffled around awkwardly to face the two others.

* * *

**Confession Cam – I'm missing **_**The Bill**_** to stay up for this, you lot better appreciate it**

Adam: "So I may not have talked to anyone in a while. Or ever. But it can't be that bad. I mean what's the worst that could happen. Other than they think I'm really weird and never talk to me again and tell everyone I'm weird and I spend the rest of my life friendless and alone." He rubs the back of his head nervously and sighs "Yeah, nothing at all…"

* * *

Adam opened his mouth to speak, faltered, tried again, and started coughing. He closed his eyes, took several deep breaths, and finally, he was sufficiently steeled.

"I-I, uh, I can talk, actually" he said. As he did so, he started yo-yoing the deck of cards in his hand idly, despite the laws of physics _strongly_ disagreeing with that action.

Noah and Cody, who'd been watching Adam's pre-conversation ritual with a faint air of bemusement, took this as their cue to say something.

"So you can", said Noah, leaning back and smirking slightly. Then he noticed Adam's card yo-yoing, and his expression went back to confusion "Okay how are you doing that?"

Adam looked confused as well. Then he noticed his nervous habit, and a noticeable look of relief washed over his face

"Oh that. Just, you know, card tricks. It's just a hobby of mine really" he turned back to Noah and Cody, and fanned out the cards "Anyone for a game of, well anything, really. I mean, only if you want, it's not like you're obligated or anything, I just thought it could help pass the time and uh…" Adam began trailing off into quieter explanations and even quieter apologies.

"I'm down" interrupted Cody, shrugging his shoulders. Adam stopped rambling and smiled, and both boys then turned to look at Noah.

"Eh, why not, gotta do something to pass the time"

Adam's smile grew, and he began dealing out cards, and so time passed ever onwards.

* * *

**13:56:02**

Twilight hung over the island of Wawanakwa, the sky burning orange as the campers continued their struggles against somnia.

But as the rest of the currently awake Gophers sat, occupying their time through idle conversation, or card games, or in the case of Heather, glaring at everyone; there was one who sat alone resting her head in her hands, morose and afraid.

This one was Katie, and the reason for her melancholy was fairly obvious. The gaping hole next to her that should have been filled by Sadie.

* * *

**Confession Cam – I for one am glad of the large decrease in ear-splitting shrieks. Now if only that number would drop even more**

Katie: she sits in the confession cam curled up into a ball, sniffling quietly. Fast forwarding through the next four and a half minutes, she keeps sniffling, until she can finally muster up the words to speak: "Th-this is the longest I've been away from Sadie" is all she manages to choke out before breaking down in sobs again.

"I don't think I can do this" she whispers to herself, barely audible

* * *

Katie sighed to herself as she stared at a rock on the ground that bore a vague resemblance to Sadie. As her thoughts drifted to better days filled with best friends and mall trips and whatever else it is teenage girls do, she remained unaware of nearby thoughts arriving at her.

And by that, I mean someone had finally noticed Katie and actually cared. Two someones in fact. Lindsay and Beth, having just finished a truly riveting conversation about the important distinction between plaid and tartan (or something to that effect, both me and the Confession Cam zoned out), noticed Katie sitting all on her lonesome, and such an idea troubled them.

Electing not to beat around the bush as it were, the two girls made their way over to the third, going mostly unnoticed as a result of all the crying. It wasn't until Beth actually spoke that Katie even registered their presence.

"Are you okay?" was the question, and the answer was first surprise, then uncontrollable sobbing into Beth's shoulder. Beth patted Katie on the shoulder for a while, until Katie's sobbing died down into sniffles.

"I'm sorry" she murmured as she peeled herself off of Beth and tried to sort out her clothes. "It's just-"

"You misth your friend, don't you" Beth surmised. Katie's expression cracked, and tears threatened to well up again, but she fought them down and simply replied

"Yeah…"

Not missing a beat, Lindsay threw an arm around Katie's shoulders and pulled her in for a one-armed hug. Katie leant into it, sniffling.

"Thank you" she murmured into Lindsay's shoulder.

"Aww, don't worry, you'll see, uh…" Lindsay tried to comfort Katie as she tightened the hub, but trailed off as she realised she had no idea who it was she was referring to. The turned to Beth and mouthed a message for help. Beth mouthed back, "Sadie".

"Oh yeah; you'll see Hayley again soon, I know it" Lindsay said with utmost confidence, ignoring the slapping sound of Beth facepalming. But, as it turned out, Katie either didn't notice Lindsay's error, or chose to ignore it. Instead she looked up at the blonde girl, eyes wet with tears and asked:

"Really?"

"Sure!" Lindsay stated as she smiled down at Katie.

"If you two are asth closthe asth you sthay, there'sth no way you won't sthee each other again" cut in Beth, the sentimentality of such a statement offset somewhat by the sheer sibilance of her sentence being the stimulus for several litres of spittle to start spraying from between her teeth.

"And until you do, we'll be your friends!" Lindsay added happily, both girls choosing to ignore Beth's slight speech issue.

"You will?"

"Of coursthe!" Beth exclaimed. She and Lindsay smiled happily at Katie, and Katie smiled back. Then, Lindsay released Katie from the hug, and the three girls sat down together, and the conversation about girl things gained a new participant.

"Stho istn't Justhtin like stho cute?"

"Oh I know, he's just gorgeous!"

"He's no Taylor, but he is really hot…"

As their conversation about that paragon of a human specimen who I have no attraction towards whatsoever continued, the group were blissfully unaware of an eavesdropper.

Heather had heard the whole tale, and as her pawns made a new friend, an evil grin crept onto her face, and she began chuckling to herself as she steepled her fingers menacingly.

The grin was wiped off her face when said pawns evidently ran out of words to describe the perfection that is Justin, and resorted to very loud "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"-ing.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Does anyone have a screwdriver I can drive through my eardrums?**

Katie: She looks defiant, and holds her fist in the air with an aura of determination "I'll see you soon Sadie! But first, I'm gonna win this! For you!"

Heather: "I can't exactly get Katie into the alliance, not without letting the others know something's up", she begins filing her nails as she continues on "but a new pawn? That I can work with"

* * *

**14:34:35**

At long last, the sun had set on what felt like the longest day ever, replaced by the surprisingly chilly summer night of Canada. It was rather windy I suppose.

By this point in time, most of the campers had hit their second wind, and none had fallen to the Sandman's embrace since Owen. Conversation flowed far more freely, as the sleepless delirium slowly begun to set in, gradually lowering everyone's inhibitions.

In the Bass encampment, Shannon and Izzy swapped wild stories, Izzy currently detailing the time she allegedly fought off a legion of angry chefs with nought but a poorly cooked leg of lamb and the giant 'E' from the restaurant sign. A few metres away, DJ was looking at the trees, stroking his chin in thought as he examined them rather critically. Courtney was still jogging on the spot, though her movements had gotten more and more jerky as time went on, as the exhaustion continuing to get to her. And towards the front of the group, Harold had finally finished his lecture on timekeeping (with a brief tangent on Swiss watch smuggling), and he and Ezekiel conversed far more normally, the prairie boy having several questions about life as a normal teenager that Harold was more than happy to answer. Currently, Harold was attempting to explain slang

"Soo, wicked and sick are good, bad and ass are bad, but badass is good?" despite the lesson, Ezekiel still seemed incredibly confused. Despite his trepidation though, Harold was pleased with his progress. He clapped his hands together as if praying, and gave the prairie boy a small bow

"Excellent! You have learned well, my young Padawan" Ezekiel leaned backwards, leaning on his hands, and shook his head.

"You know, I doon't think I'll ever get the hand of this teen lingo, eh." The two boys sat in silence for a minute, until Ezekiel spoke again

"Say, Haroold?" he asked. Harold looked up

"Yes?"

"You know that word you keep calling me? Pada-so'omthing?"

"You mean Padawan?" Harold replied, cocking his head to the side in confusion

"Yup, that. What's it mean, exactly?"

"It's a term from Star Wars, it refers to the apprentice Jedi training under a Jedi Knight" he explained like it was obvious

"Oh" Ezekiel remained quiet for a few seconds "What's a 'Star Wars'?" he then asked.

Harold did not reply with words, at least not initially. Instead, he let out a long and probably exaggerated gasp.

"You mean you've never even heard of the greatest saga known to man?" he asked once he'd finished gasping. Ezekiel tentatively shook his head.

"I had no idea that you were this out of the loop. Gosh, if I'd known, I'd have started with the bare essentials." With a determined look in his eye, Harold briskly stood up, confusing Ezekiel further.

"Uh, Haroold, what are you doing?"

"My duty" said Harold solemnly as he bent down to pick up a long stick "Clearly, it falls to me to tell the greatest tale ever know." For a moment the noble façade broke "Gosh, this would be so much easier if Chris gave us a DVD player"

By this point, Ezekiel's look of confusion had begun turning into one of concern. He opened his mouth to ask Harold what he was doing again, but the nerd pre-empted him

"Hush, young Padawan. Now is the time for the debut of the one man show I worked on at Performing Steve's Performing Arts Camp." He grasped the stick in two hands as though it was a sword, and assumed a battle stance, the stick raised high to his forehead

"Now, our story begins a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, on a planet called…"

* * *

**Confession Cam – I can't tell who's more sleep deprived, him for doing that, or me for watching all of it**

Ezekiel: He nervously adjusts his toque "You knoow, I'm starting to think Haroold isn't exactly a normal teenager, eh"

* * *

Across the Bass encampment, Izzy was just finishing her latest story

"And then '**BOOM**' the head chef came out of the horse!" she yelled, arms raised above her head wildly, and a manic grin plastered on her face. Shannon, who was next to her, simply raised an eyebrow at her

"Ye know, I dinnae believe half th' shite tha' comes outta yer' gob. But fuck me if it in't entertainin'. Ye ever' consider'd writin' books?" Izzy grinned wildly at this

"Oh, I thought about that. I even went to a library to practice my storytelling skills, but the threw me out when I turned this dusty old book into a pop-up book. Apparently, it was a 'priceless artefact' or something. They tried to have me arrested, but I made a hang-glider out of the autobiography section and escaped off the roof!" she said in a single breath

"The fuck kind of library is tall enough tae hang-glide off?" Izzy's grin somehow grew wider than it already was

"The big one." Shannon looked at her funny, then shook her head with a small smile, and looked away. As it happened, she looked in the direction of Ezekiel and Harold

"Hey, Dizzee Rascal," she began as she nudged Izzy with her elbow "what th' fuck is Beanpole over there up tae?"

Izzy looked to where Shannon was gesturing, and was met with the sight of Harold swinging a stick around with impressive finesse, and narrating a series of increasingly strange events. In front of him sat Ezekiel, who was suffering more and more second-hand embarrassment by the second.

"Now this I haftae see" Shannon said as she walked on over to the two misfits, Izzy following behind with an eager grin.

"An' what th' fuck's this shitshow then?" Shannon asked as she dropped herself down on the ground next to Ezekiel, Izzy splaying herself out on her back like a cat next to her. Ezekiel jumped a little, but quickly regained his composure as best he could.

"Um, Haroold's explaining what a Star Wars is, eh", he said, gesturing to the display Harold was giving.

"And then _vwoosh vwoosh_, Revan defeated Malak in single combat, and destroyed the Star Forge…" Harold narrated, swinging his stick as though decapitating an opponent in front of him. Before either Shannon or Ezekiel could pass further comment, they were interrupted by Izzy

"Ooh, ooh, I love Star Wars!" she exclaimed, jumping to her feet and procuring a stick of her own from… somewhere "my uncle was going to be in Star Wars, but he kept taking the podracers out for joyrides so he got fired and replaced by this Irish guy who kept wanting to find people"

Harold seemed rather put out at Izzy's interruption, and looked to be about to start complaining, but was interrupted yet again, this time by Izzy swinging her stick at him. Harold managed to parry the blow fairly easily, swatting the stick away. Izzy brandished her stick at Harold like a pirate with his first cutlass.

"En guarde!" she proudly proclaimed, her grin never leaving her face. Harold stared at her for a second, before adopting a fighting stance with his own stick, grasping low in both hands, pointed skywards.

"I must warn you: I have been trained in all seven forms of lightsabre combat at Jedi Master Steve's Jedi Camp." Izzy gave no verbal response, her grin simply widening, threatening to stretch out past her cheeks. With no further words, the two lunged at each other, sticks clacking against each other while both made 'vwoosh' noises with each swing.

From the ground, Ezekiel and Shannon looked on in wide-eyed confusion, neither of them having any clue what to make of the two redheads swinging sticks at each other. After a minute of silence, between the two, Shannon eventually spoke

"Fuck me, is no' even ben' a day an' we've already got a sword fight." She turned to Ezekiel "So, how long 'till someain carks it?" Ezekiel looked at her confused for a moment, trying to piece whatever the hell it was she just said together. Before he could, Shannon spoke up again

"Actually, now tha' I think aboot it, there's nae danger a' tha' happenin. I mean, look a' Beanpole, he'll tire hes'self out a'fore the five-minute mark." Ezekiel looked back to the duelling pair, and sure enough, despite a scant few second having passed, beads of perspiration were already formed on Harold's forehead, and his breathing was becoming more and more laboured. Visibly relaxing, Shannon, flung her arms behind her head and leant back, content on enjoying the show before her.

"So, Wurzel, wha' in th' fresh hell possessed ye' tae come to this place?" Ezekiel looked at her, as if expecting her to cut him off again. When nothing came, he turned back to the fight in front of him and began.

"Well, I suppoose it all began at the end of that spelling bee, eh…"

* * *

Meanwhile, at the other end of the campfire pit, there was tension in the air.

On the ground were Adam and Noah, staring intensely at each other, neither boy willing to blink first. Without breaking their gaze, they both drew a card and added it to the hands they were holding.

Simultaneously, their concentrated frowns shifted into triumphant grins, and they both slapped their cards on the ground, yelling victoriously as they did so

"Straight flush!"

"I summon the unstoppable Exodia!"

Their triumphant grins remained for a second or so, before both were replaced with a look of confusion. It was Noah who broke the silence

"How long have you been playing Yu-Gi-oh?" Adam's confused frown deepened.

"How long have you been playing poker?" he replied, tilting his head to the side. Noah frowned

"Touché" he conceded, casually throwing his cards into the pile in the middle.

From in-between the two confused victors, Cody's eyes flicked between the two hands of cards he held

"Aw man" he lamented as he threw down both his pair of aces and his Winged Dragon of Ra.

Assuming the game to be over, Adam somehow began undealing the cards, causing them to fly off of the ground and into a neat pile in his hand. Next to him, Noah and Cody looking on with confusion.

"Okay seriously how do you do that?" asked Noah incredulously. Adam paused mid undealing, the card still hovering in the air, and looked at Noah with slightly panicked eyes, then pointed to himself. Noah nodded, his face conveying the unspoken statement of 'obviously'.

"I mentioned the card tricks, didn't I?" Adam asked. When he received no response, he elaborated "It's just, card tricks are something of a hobby of mine. Well, more like magic tricks as a whole, but card tricks are the only ones that work. Well, I say work, more like don't go wrong"

"What's the difference between a trick that doesn't work and a trick that goes wrong?" asked Cody.

"Well, er, a trick that doesn't work sorta just kinda… fails. A trick that goes wrong still happens, but not in the way you plan."

"How so?" asked Noah. Adam stammered for an explanation for a moment, before drooping his head.

"It's easier to show you" He stood up, and started rummaging around in his pocket for something, while Noah and Cody moved themselves to sit on top of the log, anticipating an imminent demonstration. After rummaging in his right pocket for 10 seconds, Adam switched to his left, failed to find what he was looking for there also, then looked in his hat, and pulled out a small plastic sphere about the size of a pebble.

"So, uh, you guys know the whole 'disappear in a puff of smoke' thing, right?" His impromptu audience nodded.

"Yeah, well, uh, I've been trying to figure that out, and I've _almost_ got it, but there's still some, er, significant technical issues, so to speak"

Adam took several deep breaths, and after rolling out his shoulders, clicking his neck, and exhaling once more, he threw the plastic sphere down on the ground as hard as he could. The sphere burst open with a loud '**poof**', and a large amount of smoke poured out, covering not only Adam, but Noah, Cody, and the log they were sitting on. All three began coughing profusely.

After several seconds, the smoke cleared, and Adam remained standing exactly where he was. But something had changed in the cloud of smoke.

Looking down, Cody and Noah noticed that the log they had been sitting on had vanished. They stayed there, suspended in the air for a second, before looking at each other with worried looks on their faces. Then, they both tumbled to the floor, landing hard on their rears.

"Sorry" Adam called to them "I'm still working out the bugs with that one"

"There's more than one?" asked Cody from the ground. Adam sighed

"Just wait."

* * *

"Turned oot the bit of paper she stuffed oop my nose was a poster fer this shoow, eh." Ezekiel finished his story, and Shannon looked mildly concerned.

The battle was over. Harold lay on the ground, clutching his chest, wheezing heavily, moaning something about 'heart palpitations again'. Izzy was knelt over him, rubbing a pair of pink slippers she'd pulled out of… somewhere together, until the point they were crackling with static charges that bounced from slipper to slipper with a bright blue glow.

"Clear!" she yelled as she plunged the slippers down on to Harold's chest, the makeshift defibrillator causing Harold's body to rise off of the ground briefly, twitching and smoking. Harold's only response was a moan of pain, and Izzy began rubbing the slippers together again. From the log nearby, Ezekiel turned to Shannon

"Shooldn't we be helping them?" he asked, concern etched all over his face. Shannon, on the other hand, seemed unconcerned.

"Wurzel, I've ben' 'ere three days, an' in tha' time I've learned two things. One, ye dinnae piss oaf Eva, and two, ye dinnae get yersel' involved in anythin' Dizzee 'as planned"

"But I think Haroold's having a heart attack, eh." Shannon turned to inspect the resuscitation more closely.

"Nah, i''ll be fine" she eventually concluded, waving her hand dismissively. And surely enough, after a second shock to the chest, Harold awoke, coughing and complaining about a singed aorta.

"See, wha'd I tell ye? Fine"

As if fate itself were listening, at that exact moment there was a faint '**poof**' from above the two, and with that as the only warning, a large log descended from the heavens and slammed into the ground next to Ezekiel and Shannon with a massive **'THWACK' **, the impact launching them up into the air, the log standing proudly upright like a totem pole without the weird faces. Everyone on the Bass gaped at the sudden appearance of the log, and as a result no-one noticed the faint yell of "Sorry!" from the other side of the campfire pit.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Have to say, was not expecting that outcome**

Shannon: She wipes the sweat from her brow "Fuck me, tha's ten years oaf mah life"

Ezekiel: "Is the ootside woorld always this dangerous, eh?"

Adam: He holds his face in his hands "I swear, I have no idea why it does that". He lifts his head up and sighs to himself "At least no one got a concussion this time."

* * *

**17:04:47**

Midnight had come and gone, and the moon hung ethereal overhead, basking the campers in its pale reflections. The cold Canada winds blew through the campfire pit, sending chill to bones and chatters to teeth. Harold had passed out for good not long after being resuscitated, claiming exhaustion, and was snoring against a log, irritating everyone within earshot. The only other Bass to have fallen into slumber was Tyler, whose eyes had slowly drifted shut around midnight.

Over in the Gopher side, those responsible for the sky log Izzy currently sat atop in lotus position were back at the card games, having actually settled on playing a single game at a time. Not that the individual game mattered, as the winner always seemed to be Adam, who possessed an uncanny knack for getting the exact right card at the exact right time, and always seemed to know when someone was bluffing. Noah suspected foul play, but lacked any real evidence, so kept going in the hope of catching the wallflower in the act, or at the very least figuring out how he made the cards fly. Heather continued her irritated observations of her teammates, reserving her worst glares for Gwen and Trent, whose conversation was still ongoing, and showed no signs of stopping in the foreseeable future. In front of Heather, Lindsay, Beth and Katie continued their conversation about girl things I understand half the words of, though during conversational lulls Katie would sometimes look off into the middle distance morosely. Justin stood alone away from everyone, hands on hips proudly, abs showing through the slightly too tight shirt he wears I swear I am heterosexual.

On the Bass side of things, DJ was for some reason in the process of climbing a tree, though his large build made such a task difficult due to the weaker branches snapping under the pressure. Duncan watched his progress curiously, laughing to himself at the falls, while next to him Geoff sat with his chin in his hands, being oddly quiet for once. Courtney was still jogging on the spot, but at this point jogging was hardly the right word for it. Staggering on the spot would be more accurate, or maybe faltering on the spot. Eva sat alone, listening to angry-sounding music and glaring at anyone who drew near. Harold and Tyler had been propped up against logs, and were snoring away contentedly. From atop the sky log, Izzy regaled Shannon and Ezekiel with increasingly bizarre stories that she claimed were true. Shannon seemed to enjoy them, while Ezekiel looked more and more as though he was regretting ever venturing into the outside world.

And alone in front of all the Bass, Bridgette sat, cold and slightly afraid. A particularly frosty breeze blew through the campfire pit, chilling the campers to the bone, and was completely unstopped by the thin summer hoodie Bridgette wore. She hugged herself, teeth chattering, and tried her best to ignore the cold, the deep dark woods only a few metres away, and the fatigue that plagued her more and more with each passing minute.

Bridgette was taken out of her reverie by the sound of someone sitting down next to her, a relatively heavy 'plunk'. She uncurled herself from her little ball and turned around to see Geoff lounging about a metre from her, a relaxed grin on his face but a nervous glint in his eyes.

"Hey" he said, flicking his cowboy hat out his eyes almost too casually for it to be natural "How, uh, how's it going?"

Bridgette looked at the ground remorsefully, and sighed. "It's… not going well. I'm cold, I'm tired, and the woods are freaking me out." She punctuated that last thought with an involuntary shudder.

"Yeah, I saw you shivering back there, you must be pretty cold."

"I know. Stupid summer hoodie." The last part was muttered to herself, but not quietly enough for Geoff to not catch it.

Geoff said nothing, instead responding by taking off his shirt and passing it to Bridgette. She looked at it, then Geoff in confusion, to which he simply replied

"I know, it's not much, but it's better than nothing, right?"

Bridgette's confused look never left her face as she asked, "But won't you get cold?"

Geoff laughed and waved her off

"Nah, it's all good brah." He said as he chuckled again. "I've had ice dumped on me at parties too many times to really feel the cold"

Bridgette finally cracked a smile, and she draped Geoff's shirt over her shoulders. As she did so, Geoff hastily turned around to look back at Duncan, who happened to be watching the whole exchange with his chin in his hands and a bored look on his face.

Geoff shot Duncan a look that said without words "Am I doing this right?". Duncan's response was equally nonverbal. He rolled his eyes, but flashed Geoff a thumbs up and leant back with the faintest hint of a smile on his face.

Geoff grinned, and turned back to Bridgette excitedly, just as she'd finished adjusting the shirt for maximum warmth.

"That's better. Thanks." She said as she smiled warmly at Geoff.

"No problem brah." Geoff said as he leant back into a far more relaxed position.

And as the conversation continued, two new friends found a bulwark against the inky tendrils of sleep.

But unaware to them both, there was a watcher of this whole process. Well another one, one that wasn't Duncan bored out of his skull.

* * *

"And then I escaped down the Nile surfing a crocodile, and the fez merchant got 25 to life!" Izzy wrapped up her tale of misadventure, and gazed down upon her almost captive audience. And something was amiss. While Shannon was paying just as much attention as she always was (very little), Ezekiel, who was normally listening in a combination of awe and horror, seemed worried, gazing off into the crowd of Bass with a troubled expression.

"You okay down there?" Izzy called from her perch. Shannon looked up, confused, then turned to Ezekiel and saw what Izzy was talking about, the prairie boy having not noticed Izzy's call.

"Summat on yer' mind, Wurzel?" she asked, lightly nudging him with her elbow. However, lightly is a relative term, and Ezekiel ended up toppling to the ground in a heap, letting out a startled yelp as he fell.

"Oops" said Shannon as she hauled Ezekiel off the ground like a sack of potatoes. "Ye' alright?"

"Uh, yeah, I'm alright, eh" He said unconvincingly, adjusting his toque as he did so. Shannon frowned, and raised at least one eyebrow, the status of the other remaining unknown.

"What were you looking at?" asked Izzy, having appeared suddenly from behind Shannon.

"Jesus fucking Christ when'd you get doon?!" Shannon yelled, clutching at her heart in shock.

"Um, noothing?" said Ezekiel. Izzy seemed unconvinced, and grabbed Ezekiel by the cheeks and turned his head to look in the direction he had been previously, perching her own head on his right shoulder and squinting to try and pinpoint what had him so enthralled. Shannon, shaking off the shock, joined her on Ezekiel's left, effectively sandwiching his face between theirs, causing it to turn a rather deep shade of red.

As Shannon looked out in the general direction Ezekiel was looking, she found herself stumped for ideas for what he could have been looking at. The only things of note in direct line of vision were the bossy girl who was still staggering on the spot, and the blonde girl talking with the blonde guy, who was now missing his shirt, Shannon was stumped for what had Ezekiel so entranced. Sure, the bossy girl and the blonde girl were both hot, but she didn't take Ezekiel for that sort of guy. Shirtless blonde guy _maybe_, but Ezekiel definitely didn't seem like _that_ sort of guy. Making a mental note to try and remember people's names, she released Ezekiel and moved away, forgetting all about the mental note in the process. Izzy stayed squinting intensely for a few more seconds, before shrugging and releasing Ezekiel as well, unintentionally causing him to lose his balance and fall over again.

"Hm, guess yer's jis' tired then." Shannon concluded. Ezekiel nodded from the floor, and began picking himself up

"Uh, yup, that's it, eh." Shannon's visible eyebrow raised again, but she shrugged and plonked herself down on the ground again, as Izzy began scurrying up the sky log again.

"Jis' try not tae fall asleep" she smiled and gestured to Izzy "Need someain around tae remind me not a'body here's a complete loon"

"I'll do my best." Ezekiel turned to give one last look back, before settling back in for another wild story, quietly hoping that the strange tugging feeling he got in his stomach whenever he looked at that beautiful blonde girl was just a side effect of Chef's awful cooking.

* * *

**21:43:22**

"And at last, Courtney finally falls asleep, the exhaustion of the past day finally taking its toll upon her. For once, she seems at peace, free at last from the burdens of self-imposed leadership, from the stress of high expectations. For now, she is free to just lie there and dream. One wonders what such a person dreams of, what pleasant thoughts can unwind such a highly strung girl. Does she dream of met expectations, or of finally rebelling from such rigid structures; does she dream of freedom, or of fulfilment? It's impossible to-"

"Adam, what are you doing?"

Adam paused mid-monologue at Noah's interruption, mouth still open mid-word.

"Was I doing that out loud?" he asked after several seconds of silence.

"If you're referring to the flowery analytical narration, yes."

Adam clamped his mouth shut, his face going red.

"I liked it" chimed in Cody from between the two of them. He thought for a moment, then an eager grin came to his face "Hey, could you do Gwen next?"

Adam looked confused. "Um… why?"

"Well, you seem pretty good at learning how people think," at this, Adam gave a conciliatory tilt of the head, "I was just thinking, getting a bit of insider knowledge, as it were, could be useful"

"I'm pretty sure at this point you've struck out at least twice" cut in Noah. Cody waved him off without even looking

"Ignore him, he's just jealous."

"Of what, your comedic value?" Noah shot back. Cody actually turned around for that one.

"C'mon man, why'd you have to be so negative?" he asked. Noah looked at him like he was stupid.

"I'm being realistic, and you're being delusional."

Cody didn't respond to Noah, but he did lean over to Adam and stage whisper "He's jealous"

As Noah buried his head in his hands and groaned in frustration, Adam looked at Cody curiously.

"He is?" he asked "He doesn't look jealous. More… fed up. And worryingly still"

"What?" Cody turned back to Noah, and sure enough, the bookworm had yet to remove his head from his hands, and was indeed sitting uncannily still. With a slow creaking noise, Noah toppled over forwards and landed on the ground, not even grunting in pain.

"Is he okay?" asked Adam. Cody leant forwards to check, but before he even left sitting position the sound of snoring began emanating from Noah's prone form. Cody leant back, sighing to himself.

"Another one bites the dust I guess" he said. From in front of the two boys, way off in the distance, the first streak of orange sliced through the sky, as the sun slowly began its long crawl up from beneath the horizon.

A new day had finally dawned on the 18 campers still standing, and only time would tell who would be awake to see its end.

* * *

**I'm not dead, and neither is this trainwreck!**

**So ends part 1 of the Awake-A-Thon. Yep, part 1, because this is already the longest chapter so far and it's only been a day. A few plot points have been set up, and Adam finally does something other than stutter a lot and swallow fish.**

**The sharp-eyed among you may have noticed me changing the order of events around a bit, and some that haven't occured at all, and the reason for this is threefold: 1) I feel like having absolutely nothing happening in the first twelve hours is dumb. 2) It breaks up my deranged ramblings with bits of canon, which is always good to have. And 3), I AM A GOD IN THIS REALM AND THE LAWS OF TIME WILL OBEY ME.**

**Ahem**

**This is probably the chapter I'm proudest of, and also the one that was hardest to write (funny how that works). Prior chapters had some editing errors, or I left in what I call "placeholder dialogue", which is dialogue that sucks, but gets the point of what's meant to happen in the scene across for me to come back and edit later. The most egregious example of this is the bit between Shannon and Eva, because that just did not flow well at all for me.**

**And yes, I know the bit between Bridgette and Geoff is as cheesy rom-com as it gets, but I was both out of ideas and also have friends who are currently dating who literally met with the whole "lending coats in the rain" cliche, so I'm going with it.**

**So yeah, leave a review, say what you liked, what you didn't, any advice, seriously I need that this is my first time doing anything like this, or just call me an infidel and declare a crusade against my bloodline. Follow this if you want to know when the next chapter will come out without consulting lunar charts for blue moons, and favourite if you like this that much, can't think why, but people like weird things.**

**See ya next time or something, unless we all die over the course of this apocalpyse we're all trapped in.**


	4. Sleep Now in the (Camp)Fire Part II

**THE FOLLOWING IS A NONPROFIT FAN-BASED WORK OF FICTION  
****THE TOTAL DRAMA FRANCHISE IS OWNED BY FRESH TV, TELETOON, JENNIFER PERTSCH AND TOM MCGILLIS  
****PLEASE SUPPORT THE OFFICIAL RELEASE**

**Review Roundup... thing:**

**Gucci Mane LaFlare: **Oh thank god, people like the commentary. That was foremost amongst the ideas in the category of "sounds good in my head, but may well be complete shit"  
**  
lordgemini: **I was hoping people like those two, espeically Adam seeing his utter lack of doing anything up to this point. As for the balance between those two and the canon cast, I'm working on sorting that out, but they've both sort of wormed themselves into several of the main subplots I have planned.

**Guest: **

Don't need many guesses to know who your favourite character is, huh. In all honesty, when I first planned this, Ezekiel had nowhere near as big a role as he does so far, even though the impetus for this story was a curiosity of what would happen if the gender ratios on the teams were balanced, then the ideas got away from me.

**Kyred: **

That is a question I can't really answer without mild spoilers, which I try to avoid because I have to give you people some incentive to stick around.

* * *

**Content Warning: **Contains language not suitable for good Christian boys and girls. Remember kids, don't swear, or Satan will rip out your vocal cords and use them to play terrible music at you for all eternity.

* * *

Before we begin this chapter, an important message from our… sponsor(?):

* * *

We find ourselves in an overly beige school corridor, occupied by a lone boy with his shirt on backwards. Another boy, this one possessing the knowledge of how to dress correctly, turned the corner into the corridor, and waved at the first boy.

"Hey" he said as he fell into step next to his friend and closed his locker for him "What's up?"

A few paces down the corridor, he spoke again

"How wasthaparditheothanigh?" he asked his friend. Evidently, he may be able to dress himself, but he has no idea of acceptable times to consume copious amounts of alcohol and mouth anaesthetic. Nonetheless, his friend understood him.

"It was alright. But there was this guy, and he was with his girlfriend, and he was trying to get her to something she didn't wanna do"

The correctly dressed boy nodded pensively.

"So wha'd you do about it?" he asked

"I din't do anything"

"Whoa" the second boy said, and placed his hand across the first boy's stomach, somehow freezing him in time in the process "what?"

He walked away from his friend, and turned to the camera.

"Guys, don't be like my friend who didntdonodnintgh, not doynghynhyn is pardodaproblm."

And with that, he walked off down the corridor, leaving his friend frozen in time forevermore.

* * *

It was an unquestionably beautiful morning. The sun was shining, the sky was a bright blue, and the clouds suspended therewithin were fluffy and white. The birds had stopped twittering, and had moved on to Instagram. From somewhere unknown to all, ethereal flute music washed over those campers still awake, instilling perhaps some hope that maybe today would be better, that perhaps this unending torment would rel-

"**AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH**" well so much for that idea. A shrill, blood-curdling scream rang out across the campground, cutting off the pleasant flute music abruptly, sending hairline cracks running across every glass surface in the nearby area, and drawing the attention of just about every camper still conscious, and even waking up several who weren't.

"**JESUS FUCKMOTHERING CHRIST WHY DO SO MANY OF YE' SCREAM LIKE YE'VE FOUND A FUCKIN' CORPSE?!"** yelled Shannon, who had bolted upright at the sound of the scream. She wheeled around to find whoever it was screamed so damn loud, and saw Tyler halfway across the campfire pit, curled up into a ball and pointing at a bush, gibbering incoherently.

"I duh i ibba wha be duh buh guh uh ga in the buh be bah!" Tyler rambled, still wide-eyed and pointing at the bush. He kept on going, until, Eva, who happened to be sat the closest, stomped up to him.

"**Snap out of it!**" she yelled, and smacked him on the back of the head. Tyler was completely unprepared for a blow of such magnitude, and toppled forwards at astonishing speed, his face embedding in the dirt. But at the very least, the smack served its purpose of knocking sense into him, and a very muffled "thank you" could be heard from the soil around Tyler's head.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Jeez, I'd hate to run into her in a dark alley. Or at all.**

Tyler: "Man, I thought I saw a bear about to attack me! It was so real dude." He pauses and thinks for a second "You know, normally I don't dream like this. Guess I ate something bad"

The disembodied voice of Chef Hatchet: There's no-one in the confession cam, but Chef's yelling can still be heard from outside "Chris! These mushrooms ain't the eatin' kind!"

Eva: "So now my teammates are lunatics who scream at bushes." She says with her arms folded and a scowl on her face. "This couldn't get any worse."

* * *

As if out to prove that the universe is both always listening and very sadistic, Chris Maclean chose that moment to wander into the campfire pit, looking as though he'd enjoyed a very good night's sleep, his trademark smug grin still etched on his ever-punchable face

"Congratulations campers!" hey yelled, prompting a response of numerous complaining groans from his captive audience "You've reached the 24-hour mark!" They actually hadn't, but it was as close to accurate at Chris was ever going to get

"Time to take things up a notch!" he continued, as Chef walked in dressed in what appeared to be a fluffy pink sheep costume, and holding a harp.

Chris pulled a sheet off of a large pile of something that had somehow materialised next to him, I guess his reality warping powers extend to other objects, and the pile was revealed to be a very large and hastily thrown together stack of books.

"Fairy tales!" he proclaimed, prompting another round of groans from the campers.

"Oh he's not serious" Gwen remarked to Trent I assume; he certainly wasn't listening, instead looking on the sheer number of books piled up with wide-eyed horror.

Chris took the first book off the pile, a thick looking volume bound in beige, gave an overdramatic throat-clearing cough, and overdramatically opened the book. Next to him, Chef struck up a few pleasant chords on the harp, prompting sniggers from Chris that cracked his illusion of serenity, and a retaliatory growl from Chef. Distraction over, Chris began to read in a surprisingly subdued voice I didn't know he was capable of

"Once, upon a, time" he said, speaking with the tempo of William Shatner for some unknown reason "There was, inside this boring, kingdom, a boring village. And inside, this boring, sleepy village, filled with, very boring children, who, did very boring things…"

Chris's narration trailed off, mostly because I can't listen to all of it without falling asleep myself, and the same was true for the campers. There were a great many yawns from all sides. Geoff almost fell asleep, but was snapped out of it by Bridgette, who was also falling asleep, but happened to fall into him. On the other side of the campground, Cody swayed a bit, before toppling forwards onto the floor. Next to him, Adam looked on concernedly.

"Please don't fall asleep" he said, wringing his hands nervously

"Iss fine" Cody mumbled back "I'm just gonna… go wake Noah… yeah… I'm doing that…" And then Cody fell asleep, his thoughts filled with sights of identical sheep jumping over a single fence for no adequately explained reason. Adam frowned sadly, then looked away and sighed to himself

"And then there was one, I guess"

Suddenly the tone shifted, and the gentle harp chords were replaced by soft ballet music. Chef, now having somehow changed into a ballerina's outfit complete with tutu in under a minute, began prancing about with surprising grace for a man his stature. He leapt towards the Bass, spreading some faint dust as he did so, which fell on several campers, producing yawns a general tiredness in all. He leapt to the Gophers and did the same, and produced the same reaction.

* * *

**Confession Cam – You know at this point I'm not sure who's dreaming anymore, me or them**

Ezekiel: "You knoow, I've never seen a grown man in a tutu before. And I doon't think I ever want to see it again, eh"

Heather: She has her arms folded angrily, and is filing her nails as if she has a vendetta against them. "I swear, I am billing these people for my therapy when this is over" she shudders to herself in revulsion "No-one should have to see… _that_ in a tutu. Blech"

* * *

From up a tree he had finally climbed, DJ smiled to himself as he tightened the knot fastening him to the trunk, confident in the fact that Chef and his magic ballet dust could not reach him up there. Why he thought being in a tree would prevent him from sleeping in general is a mystery to all, but it didn't even serve its primary purpose. Chef leapt with all the strength and grace he could muster, sailing past DJ as he did so, and the magic ballet dust was spread all over the boy. He yawned, his eyes drooped, and he collapsed forward as far as his bonds would allow, out for the count. Unfortunately, someone the size of DJ weighs quite a considerable amount, and that sudden change in momentum coupled with the fact that the trees, like everything else on the island, were utter shit caused the tree to topple forwards, squishing the brickhouse beneath the trunk with a loud '**THUD**'. But at least he was awake again, and since no-one except Nate the cameraman (so no-one of any relevance) saw him actually sleep he didn't count as out, so heyo, small mercies and all.

From the other end of the campfire pit, a tired call of "Timber!" came from Gwen

* * *

**25:24:44**

By the time the dual-offense story time/magic ballet dust assault was over, 5 more campers had fallen asleep: Cody was obvious; Bridgette's fall, while it may have kept Geoff awake, had failed to rouse her, and she landed out cold; Beth and Katie fell near simultaneously when Chef leapt directly over the two of them; and lastly Izzy had taken a huge dose of ballet dust from atop the sky log, and fell both asleep and off of her perch: her fall was cushioned by the conveniently place Ezekiel she landed on. 10 campers had fallen, and 13 remained: Adam, DJ, Duncan, Eva, Ezekiel, Geoff, Gwen, Heather, Justin, Leshawna, Lindsay, Shannon, and Trent. Only one could win.

Conversation had mostly died as the second wind of the campers had finally worn off during the ballet offensive, and the only conversation that continued were Gwen and Trent's continuous bonding session, and the only other sound that occurred on a semi-regular basis was the occasional loud Scottish noise from Shannon.

On the Bass side of things, Eva sat, the faint sounds of incredibly angry music coming from her earphones. Suddenly, she stood up, drawing the eyes of those sat around her. She pulled her earphones out, and shut off the music, cutting off the 'singer' mid satanic screech.

"I'm going to the bathroom." She announced, and stalked off, stomping past the ever-smug Chris. Somehow, she failed to notice her MP3 player fall out of her pocket. None of her team noticed either, as a matter of fact, but more than a day of no sleep will do that to you. Chris might have noticed, but if he did, he certainly wouldn't point it out. But someone who definitely did notice was Heather. And as she watched the small device fall to the ground, the gears began to turn in her head, and a devious grin came to her face as Heather got an idea. An awful idea. Heather got a wonderful, awful idea.

She stood up, and sauntered on over to where Eva dropped her MP3 player. Along the way, she made sure to exaggerate certain movements, to make it look as though she was simply stretching herself to work out the stiffness of 25-and-a-bit-hours of just sitting around. She got to where the MP3 player had fallen, and she began a series of more stationary stretches. Her eyes were constantly darting back and forth, waiting for a moment when no-one was looking too closely at her. Finally, her moment came: she leant down, and stealthily grabbed Eva's MP3 player, tucking it away in her shorts pocket. She finished her stretching, and walked back down to her seat next to the barely awake Lindsay. She took the MP3 player out of her pocket and caressed it evilly, smirking in an equally evil manner as she did so; Lindsay noticed, apparently not out of it enough to fail to notice such a thing

"Um, isn't that Ava's MP3 player" she asked, a confused look on her face.

"Yep" was Heather's succinct reply

"Well, won't she be like," she paused to think of an appropriate description for those consequences, and smiled as it finally came to her "really mad when she realises it's gone?" nailed it.

Heather's smirk only got eviler. "That's exactly what I'm counting on"

What Heather failed to account for was her awareness of any onlookers not being totally perfect. For as she had looked around, she had failed to check her blind spot of directly behind her, and it was from there that she had been observed, her unwilling witness only looking that direction due to the sudden movement. As Heather had leant down and purloined the MP3 player of her enemy, Adam, devoid of his two companions, had noticed, and as the consequences of those actions dawned on him, his eyes went wide in fear.

* * *

**Confession Cam: Stealing from Eva seems to me to be a lot like throwing sharp rocks at a very angry lion: a really fucking bad idea**

Heather: her smirk is still ever-present "Eva may be by far the strongest person here, but she's also the easiest to get rid of. Just turn that temper of hers on her team and presto, one elimination, coming up"

Adam: his knees are drawn up to his chest and he's rocking back and forth, talking way faster than normal "So I saw Heather take Eva's MP3 player, and I know I need to tell her about it but I can't tell her about it because Eva is terrifying but if I don't tell her about it and she finds out I knew I'll end up a stain on the floor and I can't confront Heather about it because she's even more terrifying but if I don't then that makes me almost as guilty." He finally inhales, taking a large gulp of air, and stops rocking back and forth. "What do I do?" he whimpers to himself

* * *

**27:02:54**

After the tree had fallen on him, it had taken DJ a good 12 and a half minutes to extract himself out from under it, his efforts not helped by the various woodland critters that seemed to be mocking him all the while. Once he was out, he sat his bruised form down next to Duncan, where they sat in slightly awkward silence until the arrival of Geoff, who had finally realised Bridgette was asleep after twenty minutes of one-sided and very heartfelt conversation. The conversation picked up somewhat upon his arrival, but not to any amazing degree, and eventually the conversation lulled again.

"So," said Duncan, who was laid out on his back on the ground, his head resting in his hands "anyone got their eyes on any girls?"

The silence that surrounded the three boys shattered, and Geoff and DJ looked at Duncan.

"Well, there is one girl," said Geoff, a faintly wistful look coming over him "I'm pretty sure I've got a thing for Bridgette, but I don't know if she-"

He was cut off by Duncan throwing a scrunched-up ball of paper at the back of his head

"I meant someone other than Malibu, genius"

"Oh." Said Geoff, his face now set in a confused frown "Well in that case I got nothing." He then turned to the so far silent member of their group and asked: "How 'bout you, DJ?"

DJ raised his arms in an 'I don't know' gesture, and shook his head

"Man, I never really thought about dating before coming here"

"Pfft, lame" cut in Duncan. DJ shrugged in response

"'Sides, my mama always said I should get to know a girl before I started dating her."

"I take it back" said Duncan "Now _that's_ lame"

"Hey, I think that's pretty cool" cut in Geoff. "Hey, you think that'd work for me and Bridgette?"

"I think what will work is if you stop acting all obsessed." Duncan answered in place of DJ "Sheesh, get a hobby"

"Shyeah, I would man, but there's like, nothing to do."

"I figured that was the point" said DJ "Get us so bored there's nothing to do but fall asleep"

"Well gentlemen," said Duncan as he sat up, a grin on his face and a mischievous light in his eyes "if there's nothing to do, I have a few ideas to keep us entertained"

DJ and Geoff exchanged a glance, before turning back to Duncan

"What'cha got in mind, dude?" asked Geoff.

* * *

**27:54:33**

It had taken him almost two-and-a-half hours of deliberation and psyching himself up, but Adam had finally come to a decision. He was going to talk to Eva, and tell er about what happened to her mp3 player.

He hopped to his feet, wobbling a bit as his legs protested at their sudden use. He straightened up, took a deep breath, and looked around to see if anyone was paying any attention to him. They weren't, so he gently stepped over the sleeping Noah and Cody, who looked as though they were about to start cuddling, and creeped his way over towards the Bass side of the campfire pit.

Adam slowly skulked over to the large gateway that served as the divider between the two sides of the campfire pit, and also the divider between the campfire pit and the camp itself. There was no sign of Chris, who had left shortly after he was done reading fairy tales to go enjoy a hearty breakfast and yell at some interns, or whatever it is he does in his spare time. Once Adam was behind the pole that marked the end of no-man's land and the start of the Bass side, he stopped, took a deep breath, rolled the kinks out of his shoulders, took another deep breath, clicked his neck, took a third deep breath, and finally put a foot forwards to walk towards Eva. He then froze, retracted the foot and darted out of view of everyone, hyperventilating slightly.

After a good twenty seconds of panicked breathing, Adam managed to calm himself down, and began muttering to himself apparently trying to psyche himself up again. Eventually, after a decent amount of muttering general platitudes to himself, he took one final shaky breath, straightened his posture, and stepped out from behind the tree he'd concealed himself behind, a determined expression on his face.

Only for all of that determination to be immediately knocked out of him as he walked out from behind the tree and straight into the back of Chef Hatchet, who was there for reasons known only to himself.

Chef turned around, at first seeing nothing that could have bumped him.

"These woods better not be haunted" he grumbled to himself as he scanned the treeline "last thing I need is haunted woods."

He then finally looked down, to see a visibly terrified Adam standing there, his knees knocking and his face pale.

Chef looked confused for a moment, as he tried to place which one of the numerous kids this one was. Chef had never liked kids. Eventually, he managed to match a team to the face, but no name, and he cocked an inquisitive eyebrow at Adam.

"Shouldn't you be on the other side?" he asked, sounding more confused than anything.

But being asked a question directly was too much social interaction with the big scary man for Adam to handle. With a pathetic whimper, his eyes rolled up in their sockets and he crumped to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

Chef gave Adam's unconscious form a confused look, then shook his head and sighed.

"These kids just keep gettin' weirder and weirder, man"

With that, he hauled Adam off of the ground and tucked him under his arm, then marched on back to the campfire pit, his heavy stomps drawing the attention of those still awake and without any means of entertaining themselves.

Chef literally threw Adam's unconscious form over to the Gopher side of the campfire pit, where he landed atop Noah and Cody, who were definitely cuddling now.

And so, another one bit the dust.

* * *

**30:00:00**

Despite the ever-increasing strain on the campers' mental faculties, no-one else had fallen since Adam's fear-induced slumber. Lindsay and Justin hadn't moved in a concerning amount of time, but Lindsay appeared to still be making conversation with Heather, as far as you can consider vague mumblings about shoes conversation, and Justin stood bolt upright, hands firmly on his hips, staring unblinking into the middle-distance as he fought of the demons of sleep with naught but his good looks and his winning smile and his- okay what is wrong with me? Anyway, silence reigned over the Gopher side, save for the mostly hushed conversation between Gwen and Trent, and the occasional sleepy murmurs from one of the many campers laid out on the ground.

On the Bass side, silence would have reigned, had it not been violently deposed several times, first by Harolds angry cry of "**Idiots!**" as he was rudely awakened by a handful of shaving foam and a feather, secondly by the chorus of sniggering that followed Harold's rude wakeup as Duncan and Geoff made a break for it, and thirdly by Shannon's refusal to talk in a volume even remotely close to quiet as she explained to Ezekiel what a prank is.

The noise from across the campground roused Heather from the waking coma she'd been in, and she turned to her one conscious 'ally' and nudged the blonde girl on the shoulder.

"We should talk about our strategy." Heather did not receive a particularly intelligent response, even by Lindsay's standards. Her eyes fluttered open, blinking rapidly, and all she managed to get out was a "Huuuh?" before she fell backwards out cold.

"Great" Heather muttered as she folded her arms, glancing at the unconscious forms of Beth and Katie slumped together for a moment, before diverting her eyes to glare angrily at the ground.

* * *

"But, but, _why_?"

"Because Wurzel, sumtaims ye just wantae have a bit of a laff at someain else's expense"

Shannon was still trying to explain how pranking exactly worked to Ezekiel, who seemed to have grasped the concept, but was struggling with figuring out the motivations.

"I joost doon't get why people want that, eh? This just seems... mean"

"Ye got me there" Shannon conceded "'S why I only ever pull tha' shite on me mates. An' I guess I throw bricks at trains but e'en me fuckin' da does tha'"

This revelation about Shannon's pastimes threw Ezekiel for a loop, before he'd even finished with the first one

"You throw bricks at trains?" he asked, struck dumb by the idea.

"Weel, ye dinnae throw a brick at any auld train." Shannon replied, sitting up from her slouch "What ye' do, is ye' aeem fer furst class, and hae a laff at the faces on th' posh twats sat all coozy and nice in their plush seats wi' their fancy coffees."

Ezekiel opened his mouth to speak, presumably about to ask another question, but was cut off by Shannon continuing with her rambling

"Honestly, ye shood try it some taim. Great cather..." she trailed off as she tried to work out what the next word was "catar, cater... eh fuck it, it's a great stress relief"

"We doon't have trains where I live, eh"

Shannon's eye widened in surprise, and she turned to look at Ezekiel in confusion

"Fuckin hell, how far oot in th' middle a' bum-fuck naewhere de ye' live?"

"Quite a bit, eh. The nearest toown is an hoours drive, and they doon't have trains there."

"My gran lives in a village wi' less people than I hae fingers, and they hae a fuckin' train station." She said as she shook her head, "The fuck is wrong wi' ye' Canadians?"

Ezekiel shrugged

"I doon't know." he said "I've never been to much of it, eh"

Shannon gave him a vaguely quizzical glance, then look away and shrugged.

"Aye, fair enuff."

* * *

Across the campground, back in the Gopher encampment, the only conversation on that side of the field was still going on, as somehow Gwen and Trent hadn't run out of things to talk about in a day and a quarter. Granted, at this point the conversation had moved to just asking each other basic questions, but the fact they'd been doing so for this long is certainly impressive. I can't hold a conversation for more than 5 minutes.

"Okay..." Trent began, trying to think of a suitable question he hadn't asked yet "Lucky number?"

Gwen looked up in thought for a moment as she tried to dredge that information from her sleep-deprived brain

"Thirteen" she eventually said.

"Interesting," Trent replied "isn't that usually _un_lucky?"

"Maybe," said Gwen with an almost coy smile "but I don't really bother with usual." She drew her knees up to her chest as she thought to herself for a suitable response. "Favourite song?"

Trent, unlike his companion, needed very little time to think

"She Would Be Loved" he said with cool confidence. Gwen gave him a sort of funny look, first trying to remember what song that was, then realising he'd misremembered the title and judging him for openly admitting to liking Maroon 5; but before she could come to a conclusion, she was interrupted by Trent's question.

"Favourite colour?"

"Umm, midnight blue"

"Oooh, mysterious," said Trent, cutting Gwen off before she could ask another question "I like it."

Gwen smiled at him, an action she'd been performing uncharacteristically frequently for the past day. Then her head drooped, and she yawned, and it looked like she was to be the next victim of torpor.

"Ah, don't fall asleep!" Trent quickly interjected, placing a concerned hand on Gwen's shoulder. He stammered for a few seconds and his eyes darted about wildly as he thought of something to get his dark-clad companion out of the clutches of the night

"Okay, quick, favourite movie moment" he asked. Gwen's head lolled back, and she released a tired sounding groan as she did so. She blinked a few times, her eyes eventually focussing on Trent again, and her head cleared as she tried to dredge more information out of it. And as the information came to her, the faintest dustings of a blush appeared on her cheeks.

"Egh, you're gonna think it's cheesy" she said, refusing to meet his gaze.

"I promise I won't" he replied, a calm, honest smile on his face. Gwen studied his eyes for a moment, decided that she saw something trustworthy in them, and sighed to herself with a smile on her face.

"Okay... the kiss at the end of that road trip movie. You know, the one with the guy and three girls?" I can't say I know that one. Trent did however.

"I know the one" he said, pausing briefly to chuckle "you like that movie?"

"Ugh, shut up" Gwen said playfully, a smile tugging on her lips despite the embarrassment. In the fits of sniggering that followed, neither of them noticed the creaking sound off to their right, followed by the two faint thuds. Nor did they notice the rustling of clothing, nor the heavy footfalls in their direction. They did, however, notice Owen when he sleepwalked past them completely naked. Thew pair's eyes widened as their gaze followed is snoring stroll into the woods and far away.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Hey, do you think I could sue for therapy bills? Because what the fuck?**

Trent: He says nothing, simply huddling on the toilet seat in the foetal position, rocking slowly back and forth, his face pale and his eyes wide. He shudders once, and makes a noise of revulsion. He takes a long series of deep breaths, and tries to compose himself.

He fails and starts shuddering again.

Owen: "Did I mention that I ate the entire dish of baked beans and maple syrup?" he starts tapping his fingers together nervously "Funny thing about baked beans: they make me sleepwalk"

* * *

**36:27:02**

Time continued to pass in that vaguely nebulous way only it can, with minutes seeming like hours and hours seeming like minutes. Trent and Gwen had given up on trying sit, instead lying on their backs gazing up at the stars, pointing out constellations and other such sappy stuff that makes me feel sick. A few feet away, Heather seemed to be staying awake solely through a combined effort of willpower and hatred, glaring that anything that moved, and several things that didn't but looked like they did through tricks of the light. Justin stood as statuesque as ever, his luxurious hair rippling faintly in the breeze. Leshawna also sat alone, not wanting to intrude on Trent and Gwen's bonding time, and wanting nothing to do with Heather had resorted to staying awake out of sheer stubbornness, slapping herself every time she felt her eyes drooping.

On the Bass side of things, everyone was just as out of it as the Gophers. Eva hadn't noticed the fact her mp3 player was missing, based on the fact she was humming and nodding her head along to non-existent music. Shannon and Ezekiel had tried their best to keep up their conversation, but had failed and now sat poking each other to make sure the other stayed awake. And finally, Duncan, Geoff and a reluctant DJ had continued to mess with people all over camp, most of them being interns. Or at least they had until DJ had collapsed while carrying a bowl of warm water and he'd ended up dumping it all over Geoff. On the plus side the water kept Geoff awake, so the Bass were only down one more player rather than two.

As for the sleepers, there was very little happening, what with them being asleep. The only developments were Noah and Cody beginning to snuggle and Owen sleepwalking off the cliff.

The score was 5 all, and it was still anyone's game, any advantages in terms of constitution long since exhausted as the remaining campers kept themselves going on fumes and sheer willpower.

* * *

**38:38:38**

Like trees in a storm, the battering of the winds can remove even the strongest oak, and the batterings of time can put even the strongest willed campers to sleep. As was found out by Leshawna, who's strategy of slapping herself to keep herself awake worked, until she slapped herself too hard and knocked herself out. With Geoff's luck having finally run out, as he fell asleep for good with no-one left to wake him in their final moments of consciousness, the score was still even at 4-4.

It was at about this point that Leshawna found herself soused from her uneasy slumber by the sounds of movement and voices off to her left, as Trent and Gwen had finally given up on stargazing, having gazed intently at all of the stars worth mentioning. Instead, they turned their attention to the other male on their team still awake, the beauteous Justin.

"Look at him" said Gwen, pretending to be inspecting him but in fact checking out his pecs "he's like a statue."

The Adonis that was Justin gave no response to Gwen's comment, not even moving his eyes to look at her, as he stood stock still staring defiantly into the distance.

"He hasn't moved in over," Gwen paused to try and recall some semblance of time "30 hours!"

And yet Justin remained still, not even blinking as he remained statuesque. He continued to remain still as Gwen and Trent made funny noises and waved their hands in front of his face (and also all about the place but I think that was just Trent having a brief psychotic episode) to try and get a reaction out of him.

"Amazing" Gwen remarked "Just look at the concentration"

And that was when it happened. Seemingly finished with bothering Justin, Gwen tapped him on the head and turned to leave. This was the first thing that actually got a reaction out of Justin. He shook his head, a confused frown replacing the confident smile he'd worn for the past 38 hours, and his eyes opened. Gwen and Trent gasped simultaneously.

From across the campfire pit, and demonstrating wildly inconsistent powers of perception, Eva's eyes narrowed, and she pointed angrily at the model

"His eyelids are painted!" she yelled accusingly "I saw it!"

Chris Maclean, being as annoyingly physics defying as ever, chose that moment to randomly walk out from behind a tree he definitely hadn't been behind a second ago.

"Shut up! Oh, I've gotta see this!" he said as he did so, and as quickly as he appeared, he bolted off to the other side of the campfire pit, crossing the whole thing in a fraction a second and appearing right next to Justin to inspect his eyes. Justin gave the host a nervous smile, and a verdict was quickly reached by the supposed host with the most

"That is so freakin' cool!" he said, and for a moment Justin looked relieved. "But," he quicky added "you're still out dude"

And Justin's smile fell as his entire figure drooped, and he trudged away to wherever it is the losers go, eerily making no sound whatsoever as he did so. And so, the score became 3-4 in favour of the Bass.

* * *

**39:05:32**

Midnight had once again come and gone, and by technicality that meant the third day of the Awake-A-Thon was here. None had fallen asleep since Justin, but everyone was on their last legs, some on their last leg, and Trent was on about his middle desperate crawl.

Although apparently it appeared as though Duncan still had enough energy in him left for petty pranks on Harold, as he pulled the old hand in the warm water trick that baffles me to this day. Sure enough, through the power of something or other, the trick worked, and Harold's trousers were left damp and smelling like a phone booth after a Saturday night.

"Ah gross it worked!" he exclaimed, his powers of observation the envy of all, "Dude peed his pants!"

Something, whether it was Duncan's yelling or the uncomfortable soggy sensation between his legs, woke Harold up. He blinked several times, his eyes trying to shift the blurring of just waking up. He looked down, and took a few seconds to process what he saw. He quickly did, and gasped in terror as he drew up his knees and dropped his hands down to his crotch to hide his embarrassment.

Harold ran off to find new trousers and Duncan doubled over with laughter, and from the other side of the Bass encampment, Ezekiel had noticed what was going on.

"Hey, um, Shannoon?" he asked, nudging her in the side. Shannon came out of the glassy-eyed stupor she'd been in, making several confused Scottish noises, until she regained enough of her senses to realise what was going on.

"Wha's up Wurzel?" she asked.

"Um, Duncan was dooing another one of those pranks you toold me about on Harold."

Shannon's easy smile faded

"Awright, wha' was th' fucker up tae?" she muttered to herself as she looked at where Harold's previously prone form had previously occupied. Eventually, her eye focussed on the bowl of water. Several seconds of mental gears tuning later, and she'd worked out what it was Duncan had done.

"Oh fer' fuck's sake really? He pulled tha'?" she muttered, apparently disgruntled with Duncan's methods "At least do summat' wi' a wee bit a' class."

"Doon't you throw bricks at trains, eh?" Ezekiel pointed out. Shannon turned to him and gave him a slightly offended look for a few seconds, before quickly returning to her normal expression of neutrality.

"Ach, wha'ever," she said, shrugging "I'm gointae go see if Beanpole needs a new pair a' breeks."

She stood up, stretching out the kinks in her back as she did so. A second later, she froze and her eye widened slightly.

"Ah fuck, I shouldnae hae stood up so quick." She tried to take a step forwards, but her leg simply swung idly in the air. Without two feet on the ground to steady her, she began wobbling around, her balance clearly failing as her system tried to cope with the sudden movement and the sudden rush of blood to the head. All poor Ezekiel could do was watch in concern as the one person left he knew the name of toppled backwards, falling unconscious the instant she hit the ground.

A few seconds of silence passed, before Ezekiel finally found the words to summarise his situation

"Uh-oh"

* * *

**42:22:24**

Once again, the sun was peaking over the horizon, slicing through the dark of the night with rays of orange, and once again the ethereal morning flute music began.

Across the island, several campers began to stir from their long slumbers, awakening to the dawn with bleary eyes and foggy minds. One by one, they all began standing up, stretching out the stiff joints that come from sleeping on the floor or against a tree stump, and making their way to the unknown that is offscreen where I can't see them.

In the Gopher side, it appeared that Noah was yet to rouse, lost in the pleasantries of dreamland. Indeed, his dreams seemed especially pleasant, what with the vigour he was putting into his kissing of Cody's ear. But eventually, he slowly began to awaken, coincidentally at the same time as Cody.

And then came the screaming. First Noah, screaming in terror at the idea of having kissed a guy. Then Cody, screaming at the idea of a guy having kissed him. Then Adam bolted upright screaming because he thought something serious was happening.

"Wait," the smallest boy asked "why are we screaming?"

But he received no reply, as Noah and Cody had both bolted as far away from the other as their legs could carry them.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Ya think that's the only action either of them have ever got?**

Noah: He doesn't say anything, instead he furiously brushes his teeth as if to expunge the fact he kissed a guy from his mouth

Cody: "I would just like to state for the record that any kissing that may have happened in that scenario was entirely non-consensual on my part"

* * *

As the last of the sleepers cleared out of the pit, leaving only the final six teenagers railing against tiredness, none other than Chris Maclean decided now was the perfect time to show up from literally nowhere, producing a cup of coffee from presumably the same nowhere, or his back pocket, but neither answer makes much sense.

"What is the matter with you people?" he asked, his beady little eyes betraying no sign of tiredness as he paused to take a smug sip of his coffee "Fall asleep already!"

Before he could say more, or devise some new method of driving the sleep-deprived teenagers left in his care past the point of insanity, his merry stroll across the campground was interrupted by Gwen grabbing his leg and clinging to it like a toddler.

"You gotta hook me up, man," she pleaded, gazing longingly at the Styrofoam cup containing the bitter nectar she so desperately craved "I'll even eat the grinds, anything!"

She began reaching up for the cup, with Chris forced to stand on his tiptoes to keep the precious liquid out of her reach as the goth beneath him swiped with wild detirmination.

"Alright," Chris said, taking as large a step back from Gwen as he could "You six stay with me, the rest go take a shower" he hestured to the few eliminated campers still milling about "Seriously! You stink!"

As the final campers departed, Chris took an especially dramatic sip of his coffee, andf turned to the camera.

"I didn't want it to come to this," he began, feigning a look of remorse "I said that to Chef Hatchet last night, I said: 'Chef; I don't want it to come to this'."

* * *

**Confession Cam – I can't feel my anything anymore, when the fuck do **_**I**_** get to sleep?**

Chef Hatchet: He sits with his arms folded, a disdainful frown on his face "Pfft, yeah right. Pretty boy was downright looking forward to doing this"

* * *

"But darn it!" Chris continued, unaware of the post-production interruption, "These campers are tough! And so, I've come up with the most boring, sleep-inducing activity I can find."

* * *

**Confession Cam – Ugggggggghhhhhhhhh**

Gwen: "Oh come one, what now?" she pauses briefly, the adopts a pose of defiance "Okay, you know what? Bring it on."

Ezekiel: "I doon't think I can take much moore of this, eh" he says as he lies sprawled out as much as he can in a small outhouse

* * *

Chris pulled a book out of nowhere, and placed it down on the lectern that had somehow appeared in front of him, and adopted his weird narration tempo

"The history of, Canada, a pop, up book." the book was met with a chorus of exasperated groans, but Chris kept going "Chapter one. The beaver. National, symbol, and a 'dam', fine hat"

When he reached the pun, another chorus of groans rang out from the crowd, along with laughter from Ezekiel, who it seemed was just completely out of it

"Heh heh. Beaver." He said, and then he collapsed face first on the ground and passed out.

* * *

**47:46:45**

For the past five and a half hours, the only sound that could be heard was the dull monotone of Chris's narration of the seventeen volumes of the History of Canada in pop-up form. He was currently on Volume 5, the War of 1812, and I'm pretty sure everyone listening would rather be in the war of 1812 than right here. I know I do.

After Ezekiel fell at the first sentence, the rest of the final five held out for several volumes. It wasn't until Volume 4 that Eva succumbed, noticing only in her final moments of consciousness that hermp3 player was in fact missing. Her fall left the Bass down to their last player, with the Gophers still having three in the game.

"Which, was of course, the precursor to, the War of 18, 12" Chris was somehow still going in that same weirdly patterned monotone, his voice never faltering. The same could not be said for Heather, who slumped sideways off her stump, and lay sprawled out on the ground, her massive reserves of spite finally exhausted as her eyes fluttered shut.

And she was not the only one, as like a chain of dominoes, Trent too fell off his stump and into dreamland, the exaggerated cry of "Nooooooooo!" from Gwen doing nothing to keep him in the game.

And so, with the score at 1-1, Chris slammed his book shut, his work evidently finished, leaving Gwen and Duncan as the last players for their teams to battle it out for the win.

* * *

**50:13:37**

The silence over the campfire pit was a heavy oppressive one. With no-one else around and neither camper willing to talk, the only sounds that could be heard were the faint rustling of leaves in the wind and the birds who had moved on again to snapchat, the flighty fucks.

Gwen was slowly rocking back and forth erratically, trying to use the constantly shifting motion to keep her brain occupied on something; meanwhile Duncan was experiencing some karmic retribution for the prank he pulled on Harold, as he sat with his legs awkwardly crossed trying desperately to think dry thoughts.

Seeing this as his perfect opportunity, Chris Maclean phased into being somewhere beneath the lectern that was still set up, which he popped up out of in the hope of startling the campers.

"Time for a bathroom break" he announced "Any takers?"

Despite the clear desperation he was in, Duncan refused to show weakness

"I've held it this long sweetheart," he said, and I don't know who he was referring to there "I could go all day."

"Sure you can," said Gwen, apparently not tired enough to be unable to mess with people's heads "Just don't think about rain, or a waterfall, or a dripping tap, or-"

She was cut off by an annoyed growl from Duncan, as he stood up and stomped off towards the bathroom, accompanied by Nate the cameraman, who was sent to make sure he didn't cheat somehow.

With Duncan gone and her brief bout of fun over, Gwen returned to her stump and sighed, before resuming her sporadic swaying.

* * *

**Meanwhile, on the toilet**

"Duncan, dude, you in there?" Nate the cameraman asked the bathroom stall door. There was no reply, so he knocked on the door tentatively, and called Duncan's name again.

Still no reply.

Nate took a deep breath, muttered "It's not gay if it's my job" under his breath, and pushed open the stall door.

And there, snoring contentedly into the toilet paper, was Duncan, out like a light.

Back in the campfire pit, Chris stood up from his lean on the lectern, as if sensing a development in the air. He extended his arm off of the camera, and when it returned he had a note in his hand, which appeared from nowhere.

"We have news!" he announced to his captive audience of one, Gwen lifting her head from the floor at Chris's voice

"It looks like Duncan's taken a dive on the can! Which means the official winner of the Awake-a-thon is:" he paused for dramatic effect for some reason, despite the fact the following statement was blindingly obvious

"Gwen!" at his announcement, Gwen's strength finally gave way, and her arms collapsed under her weight as she settled peacefully into a well-deserved sleep.

"The Screaming Gophers win!" yelled Chris to his audience of now no-one

After fifty long hours, it was at last over. For now at least, the campers could rest.

* * *

**The Cabins, 8.7 Galactic Standard Weeks later**

After everyone had had a nice long nap, and in doing so thrown their body clocks completely out of whack, the vast majority of the campers thought that for now, their struggles were over. That fact was certainly true for the Gophers; with no elimination to worry about, they could rest easy knowing they were safe for at least another day.

The Bass on the other hand had suffering left to endure. And not just from the imminent ousting of one of their peers, no. First, they had to contend with an _incredibly _angry teammate.

To the surprise of no-one, that person was Eva, who at that moment in time was in the process of upending every single object that wasn't bolted down in the Bass cabin, and a great many that were, in a desperate search for her precious mp3 player. After throwing out every bed, one of which contained a sleeping Shannon, who managed to remain asleep for the entire duration of her flight and the subsequent crash landing; she then threw out the bedside tables, the light fittings, the windows, a canoe, a singular ski, a kitchen sink that was there for some reason, a half-eaten roast chicken, and several musical instruments, ranging in size from a kazoo to an upright piano.

"**GRRRAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!**" She yelled, evidently quite disgruntled at her failure at finding the device. She leant out of the window at her cowering teammates and yelled again

"**Where** is my mp3 player?!" she demanded, to no reply. She continued "One of you must have stolen it, I need my music!"

She ducked back inside briefly to throw Tyler outside, who had snuck in for some reason, and she returned to the window.

"No-one is going anywhere until I get my mp3 player back!" she threw a book outside, a thick, leather-bound copy of the Necronomicon, which Harold narrowly ducked under. Tyler wasn't so lucky, as his standing up from his impact on the ground placed the back of his head straight in the tome's path, and sent him flying straight back down.

"Okay," said Courtney, turning to the rest of her terrified team. Except Izzy, who was standing in the epicentre of the thrown items with a calm smile on her face, pirouetting around them as they were thrown with surprising grace.

"Whoever took it better give it up _now_, before she destroys the entire camp!" Courtney continued

"Hey guys" came the conniving voice of Heather, standing just outside the danger zone and sounding particularly smug "Wow, this place is a mess"

She was met with a mix of annoyed glares and fed up glances, and Ezekiel didn't meet her gaze, mostly because he was cowering behind DJ, who was in turn cowering behind Geoff.

"Somone stole Eva's mp3 player" Courtney explained, looking more fed up than afraid

Heather feigned a surprised gasp, one that managed to fool the Bass at least

"You don't mean this, do you?" she said as she fished Eva's mp3 player out of her back pocket. Eva's mp3 sense went off, and she poked her head out of the cabin door with an ecstatic grin on her face

"I was wondering who this belonged to" Heather lied "I found it by the campfire pit, you must have dropped it."

Eva ran over to the mp3 player with her arms outstretched like it was her lover in a cheesy romance movie, and quickly began caressing it while showering Heather in "thank you"s.

Heather simply uttered "Sure thing" and sauntered off, hiding her smirk from her enemies.

* * *

**Confession Cam – ZZZZZ**

Heather: "Turn a team against their own members," she explains smugly, "Easiest trick in the book"

* * *

"So," Eva said to her team with a guilty expression on her face "Sorry about that little... misunderstanding"

She was met by angry glares from most of her teammates, and angry glare and an angry spit of dirt from Tyler, and a vaguely disgruntled snore from Shannon in the pile of detritus.

"Guess no-one stole it after all" she said, rubbing the back of her head nervously. The glares continued, the awkward silence broken only by Ezekiel taking this as his opportunity to make a break for the cabin, slamming the door behind him.

* * *

**The Campfire Pit again, 3 and a half hours later**

Although the layout of the campfire pit had been burned into their brains from how long they'd stayed there these past few days, the Killer Bass found themselves on those uncomfortable log stump seats again, this time, for the purpose of the marshmallow ceremony.

The Bass were all assembled, and at last Chris walked in, finally seeming to notice the large log sticking out of the ground like an uncarved totem pole. He gave it a brief glance, before shrugging and turning to the campers.

"You've all cast your votes and made your decision" he said, placing the tray of marshmallows on the empty stump where Sadie once sat "There are only ten marshmallows on this plate. When I call your name, come up and claim your marshmallow"

Fast-forwarding through his long-winded and entirely unnecessary explanation, everyone present having been here before, we come to the announcements.

"The first marshmallow goes to Duncan" Duncan shrugged slightly, and went to grab his marshmallow.

"Bridgette"

"Courtney" excited to not be in the bottom two, she practically dashed up to the tray and held her marshmallow with the reverence one might hold a newborn child

"Harold"

"Ezekiel"

"Izzy"

"Shannon"

"Geoff"

"DJ"

"Campers!" Chris announced "this is the final marshmallow of the evening" both Eva and Tyler looked nervously at the fluffy white beacon of safety, while Chris began his obligatory 2-minute long dramatic pause

* * *

**Confession Cam – Well, this voting is a right sight more interesting than politics**

Duncan: "Eva"

Courtney: "Eva"

Bridgette: "Eva"

DJ: "Eva"

Ezekiel: "Eva"

Harold: "Eva"

Geoff: "Eva"

Izzy: "Eva"

Eva: "Uhhh," she scratches her arm nervously "Tyler?"

* * *

"Tyler!" Chris eventually announced. Tyler let out a sigh of relief, and quickly walked up to get his marshmallow. He took a quick look at Eva sat by the tray, and decided a hasty exist was in order, which he promptly made

"Eva" Chris said, a total lack of sympathy evident in his voice "The Dock of Shame awaits"

She stood up, her nerves finally gone now the game was over, and she turned angrily to her team

"Nice, really nice." She threw her arms up in the air in frustration "Who needs this stupid TV show anyway?!"

And with that, she stomped off, kicking Chris in the leg as she passed

* * *

**Confession Cam – Gee, what a surprise**

Shannon: "Now, I ken thes' seem like th' perfec' taim tae get shot a' th' Bridge Troll, but I'm paranoid she's gointae find oot I did this an' break my kneecaps" she sits quietly in thoght for a moment "So, uh, eeny meeny miney Sportacus"

* * *

As Eva stomped towards the dock of shame, she was waved off by her teammates.

"Bye-bye, Eva" yelled Courtney, the only distinct voice in the faint murmur.

Eva was evidently not in the mood for farewells, as her response was to pick up a stick and angrily hurl it like a javelin at Courtney. Courtney ducked, and the impromptu projectile instead snagged the shoulder of Tyler's jersey and impaled him to the big sticky-up log (we're working on the name)

* * *

On the Boat of Losers, Eva was finally calm enough to give one last word to whoever may lsiten

"I guess I let my temper get the better of me... again" She huffed, her arms folded. "But whatever. They just lost their fiercest competitor, I hope they realised that"

And with those words said, the Boat of Losers sailed away, silhouetted by the moon as it made its way to waters unknown

* * *

**You know I'm starting to think I write maybe a bit too much for these things. Sure, this one turned out noticeably shorter than prior chapters, but that's because I frontloaded this challenge and kinda ran out of ideas for my own things, hence this one being largely the same as canon. But oh well, you can't change what's written. Well technically you can, but that's not the point**

**Speaking of changing what's written, you may have noticed that the OG first chapter, the contestant profiles, is gone, reduced to atoms. The reasoning is simple, it feels unnecessary, and a bit self-congratulatory. Hopefully this doesn't break the reviews. If it does, then, uh, PM me them I guess. I probably won't reply, because replying to messages on the internet makes my social anxiety flare up, but I'll definitely read them.**

**Up next it's the first chapter I've really been looking fowards to writing, although that's partially because I can call watching Dodgeball The Movie research.**

**See you all hopefully sooner than almost four months, follow for more if you like this kind of nonsense, leave a favourite if you're especially deranged and really like this, and if you read any of this please leave a review, even if you just say something like "ok ok so two bears were walking to the club with a clown performing and one says does this smell funny to you"**


	5. My Dodgeball Will Pierce the Heavens!

**THE FOLLOWING IS A NONPROFIT FAN-BASED WORK OF FICTION  
****THE TOTAL DRAMA FRANCHISE IS OWNED BY FRESH TV, TELETOON, JENNIFER PERTSCH AND TOM MCGILLIS  
****PLEASE SUPPORT THE OFFICIAL RELEASE**

**No review roundup thing this time, review machine broke**

* * *

**Content Warning**: I've run out of ideas for this joke. Come back later

* * *

In stark contrast to the blazing summer sun that had tormented the campers throughout their sleepless days, the day following the Awake-a-thon was grey and gloomy, as if reflecting the general mood about the island. Evidently, Mr Blue Sky had gotten bored of watching teenagers fall asleep and decided to fuck off to better parts of the world.

A few hours after Eva's departure from the Island, the returning Boat of Losers found the wandering Owen floating in the river, still fast asleep, naked, and covering in dirt, twigs, leaves, and with a bird's nest under construction in his belly button. An hour and a half, five canoes, several broken pulleys, several broken interns, and a crane Chef Hatchet had lying around later, and Owen was out of the river, and being dragged by the less broken interns towards the cabins.

* * *

**The Gopher Cabin, boys' side – about 12:30 am**

Thanks to the dreadful weekend, no-one in the Gopher Cabin was sleeping, with everyone's body clocks having been thrown completely out of whack. Cody was the only one making an attempt, tossing and turning on his bunk as he tried to shut off his brain and make it think that enough time had passed for him to sleep again. As for the rest, all were involved in their own little activities to keep themselves occupied till exhaustion caught up with them. Justin was removing the last remnants of his painted-on eyes, the process taking far longer than it should due him stopping every twenty seconds and making pretty faces in the compact mirror he had. Above him, Trent had taken out his songbook and was humming to himself as he thought of new music, occasionally pulling a pencil out from behind his ear to jot down some chords. In the bunk across from the two of them, Adam sat scribbling in his notebook, occasionally gazing intently at one of his bunkmates until they noticed him and he scurried off beneath his blanket, face red in embarrassment. And lastly, Noah sat reclined on the half empty bed, his bunkmate still off to parts unknown, as the bookworm sat back and relished the opportunity to read a different book for the first time in three days.

But alas, Noah's opportunity would be brief. He was just getting truly immersed in _The Nameless City_, when his ears pricked up at a sound that was more than just the scratchings of pencils on paper. No, this sound was more akin to a faint rumbling, and it was getting closer. At first, he tried to put it out of his mind, but as the rumbling drew ever nearer, more sounds were added to it: laboured breathing, loud thuds, and most prominently of all, unified cries of "HEAVE!" every twenty or so seconds. Noah's curiosity got the better of him, and he sat up and peered out of the window, and saw a platoon of fifteen interns dragging the unconscious body of Owen across the camp on a series of logs, like they were Egyptian slaves carrying huge rocks for the pyramids.

Noah's eyes widened, just in time for the interns to reach the steps up to the cabin. They dropped the ropes holding the slumbering sack of lard in place, and took up positions besides each limb, three on each. They hoisted the boy up, all of them visibly straining at the effort.

"On the count of three!" one of the interns by Owen's head called.

"One!" at the first number, the interns tightened their grip on Owen, and shifted their weight backwards.

"Two!" At this, the interns pulled Owen back to be level with them, and it was at this point Noah realised exactly what step 3 entailed.

"EVERBODY DOWN!" came the cry from Noah, a split second before the head intern yelled "THREE!"

The interns had been aiming for the door that somebody had left ajar; but for all their rigid co-ordination, their aim was off. Instead of sailing through the open door neat as you will, Owen was hurled about a metre to the left, putting him perfectly on target to hit the window. The window Noah was looking out of.

No-one in the cabin had the opportunity to react to Noah's cry with more than a surprised look in his direction, and Noah had found himself paralysed with fear as he saw Owen fly leg first straight towards him.

There was a strange _'schlick'_ sound, as the mud and water coating Owen's body allowed him to somehow squeeze through the open window without even cracking the frame. Unfortunately for Noah, there was no such convenient detritus to leave Noah unharmed, and he took the impact of Owen head on. Quite literally in fact, as Noah was effectively dropkicked in the face by the flying fat boy, sending both hurtling on the floor in a heap.

The other occupants of the cabin were rendered speechless at this, until a cry of

"**MMMMPPPHHHH**" could be heard from beneath Owen's left buttock. At that, the Gophers sprang into action.

For a given value of sprang at least. After the initial burst of energy that got them out of their beds, they hit an immediate blockade of only one of them even coming close to the physical strength required to move Owen.

"So" asked Cody, looking about as leaderly as a scrawny gap-toothed geek in Pokémon pyjamas can, "How do we get him off?"

The rest of the Gophers looked at him funny, while Noah continued to yell either profanities or for help, can't really tell which.

"If I had wood I could do something, but without it we're probably just gonna end up pulling inefectually for a while" said Cody, upon receiving no real response. Now the funny looks turned into Trent and Justin backing away in revulsion, while Adam looked at the group in confusion

"Dude!" Trent exclaimed.

"What?" Cody asked, then he realised exactly how much homosexual innuendo was laced into his last sentence, and his face turned redder than the surface of Mars

"No-no-no, not like that! I meant like a plank! To use as a lever!" He frantically stammered, while Trent and Justin backed away even further. "Guys, come on!"

Meanwhile, Adam was poking at Owen, his face a mixture of concern and sheer bewilderment at the bizarreness of the situation.

"Uh, you... okay under there?" he asked Noah

"Mmph m **mph **mm mmph?" he replied, which the Confession Cam informed me means "What the **fuck** do you think?"

"Okay yeah that's a fair point"

* * *

**Confession Cam – I happen to be fluent in "muffled by ass cheek. Don't ask.**

Noah: "Every single decision I have ever made that in any way led me onto this island, I now regret wholeheartedly"

* * *

Ten minutes later, and the team had gotten over Cody's faux pas, and were throwing all their weight at Owen in an attempt to roll him off. Despite the fact the weight of the four boys trying added up that of three normal teenagers and a small dog, they were making progress, Owen's body leaning noticeably to one side. Soon, the right side of Noah's face was revealed, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

The sigh of relief morphed quickly into a groan of impending agony, as Adam pushed too hard, lost his footing and slipped, landing on his stomach. And in a sort of inverse situation of the straw that broke the camel's back, the miniscule contribution to the push that Adam had been making turned out to have been essential, as all ground gained by the boys was eroded as Owen began to roll backwards towards them.

"Uh-oh" was the only sound that could me mustered by the boys, chanted by the three still standing in unison, as the principle of the conservation of momentum abandoned the situation, as the slight velocity from Owen returning to his previous position was enough to send him swinging the other way, tipping past the point of balance and rolling off of Noah and onto everyone else.

But the laws of physics weren't done violating themselves, as somehow Owen had built up enough momentum to keep going, leaving his teammates embedded in the ground as he rolled on past towards the wall that divided the two genders present in the cabin. That obstacle seemed enough to stop him, as Owen impacted the wall with a loud '**THUD**', causing a large hole in the wall to come crashing down, revealing all the Gopher girls clad in various types of bedwear, looking at the large hole that had just appeared in their wall in shock

There was a moment of audible silence as the boys slowly peeled themselves off the floor and gazed at the dumbstruck girls.

The silence was broken by Cody adopting his cheesiest smirk and a set of finger guns, and greeted them with

"Ladies." The girls continued to gape. Behind Cody, Trent, Justin and Noah all facepalmed, while Adam slowly began to sidle his way to the door, trying his best to draw as little attention to himself as possible

* * *

Ezekiel couldn't sleep. Not only had he only just woken up, but Harold was in the bunk above him, and he was snoring like his dad's chainsaw. Not to mention he could hear Shannon snoring from the other side of the cabin, meaning no-one on his team was having a particularly great night. And to top it all off, there seemed to be a constant stream of muffled yelling and crashes coming from the other cabin.

After one particularly loud crash, he'd poked his head out the window to see exactly was going on, only for the Gophers to fall mysteriously silent.

In an instant, that silence was broken, as a loud series of enraged screams came from the Gopher cabin, and Ezekiel watched as the small one he didn't know the name of dashed out the door, followed by numerous thrown projectiles, slamming it behind him and pressing his full weight against it as he hyperventilated.

As the sounds of violence from the Gopher cabin increased in volume, Ezekiel was joined at the window by Duncan, who truth be told scared Ezekiel more than a little.

For a time, the punk said nothing, simply observing the sounds of carnage and Adam fishing in his hat for a paper bag to breathe in and out of, until eventually he sniffed, and spoke.

"You know, I don't know if I'd rather be here or there right now." he said as he turned and walked back into the cabin "At least they might get knocked unconscious so they can actually **sleep!**" His irritation grew more and more as he said the second bit, culminating in him throwing a pillow angrily at Harold's bed with the last word, accomplishing very little other than slightly venting his frustrations.

* * *

**Mess Hall, the next morning**

There were approximately 2 people in a good mood when the morning call for breakfast came and the campers shuffled like zombies into the mess hall. One of them was Lindsay, who turned out to be in incredibly heavy sleeper, so much so that she missed the entirety of the midnight altercation. The other was Shannon, who also slept like the dead, and was unconscious before any of her team got a chance, so her snoring kept all of them up. Harold would likely have been fine, but in retaliation for being kept up all night Duncan had deliberately used up all the hot water in the shower just before Harold got in, so he wasn't exactly doing great. And as for Adam, while he may have escaped the carnage of the cabin, at no point did he deem it safe enough to re-enter, so he had spent the night in a tree, where he had been attacked by birds and fell out at a quarter to four in the morning. Everyone else was either tired, injured, or both.

"Well" said Chris Maclean, appearing out of nowhere as he so frequently does "Don't you all look terrible"

He was met by a chorus of tired groans from the Bass, while the Gopher girls sans Lindsay glared at their male counterparts, who shrank under their gaze. Lindsay assumed something was wrong with how she looked, so she turned to Beth and Katie in a panic asking about her nails. She was quickly reassured that she looked fine, and her friends returned to glaring.

Chris, sensing the animosity on the Gophers, turned to them first.

"Yeah, that stunt you guys pulled last night? Not cool" he said, trying his very best to hide the note of glee in his voice behind the façade of a disappointed authority figure "Do you guys know how much those repairs are gonna cost Chef?"

"How much those repairs are gonna cost **WHAT**?!" yelled Chef from across the kitchen, bringing his mallet down with all his force on a hardboiled egg, which instead of shattering, shot forwards like a rocket and nailed Tyler in the back of the head, dropping the boy.

"Relax, Chef my man, I'm kidding." Chris said as he turned to Chef, holding his hands up in mock-surrender. Chef growled and continued beating eggs with a mallet. What that has to do with cooking is beyond me, but hey, he's the chef, not me.

Chris meanwhile turned back to the Gophers

"Nah, but seriously guys, that stuff last night was _way_ cool. Think you could pull something like that again?"

The Gophers were silent, exchanging glances between each other, before eventually Trent spoke

"We'd, ah, rather not." he said, glancing awkwardly towards the girls on his team, specifically Gwen. He received a sharp glare in return, and he shrank beneath it.

* * *

**Confession Cam – So what the hell's in those eggs?**

Trent: "I really need to apologise to Gwen about what happened last night. But I don't really know how to explain what happened without sounding crazy."

* * *

Shrugging nonchalantly to himself, Chris spun around again to talk to the Bass, somehow not becoming dizzy despite spinning more than a turntable set to max speed. He scanned the table for the teen worst off, his beady little eyes quickly zeroing in on the one with the most suffering.

"Duncan" he called an especially irritating tone, rousing the punk from his nap in his porridge "You look like crap dude"

"Stuff it" was all he said, promptly falling instantly back asleep, faceplanting in his breakfast again.

"Ugh, Harold and Shannon snored all night" Courtney explained, rubbing her eyes and yawning as she did so. At the other end of the table, Shannon looked up at the mention of her name.

"I did?" she asked, sounded genuinely confused. She turned to Izzy, who was sat next to her and still as manically wide-eyed as normal "Did I?"

"Yep!" the redhead exclaimed; a night of no sleep apparently having done nothing to diminish her energy despite her sub-par performance in the challenge prior "Like a chainsaw! Or an outboard motor! Or an outboard motor made of chainsaws! Wouldn't that be awesome?! My uncle Davis had one of those, said he used them to make fishing more efficient! It was also why he had a hook hand and two peg legs!"

Shannon gave Izzy a slightly concerned one-eyed glance.

"Right..." she said, a note of worry making its way into her voice. The note immediately disappeared as she turned to Courtney and continued.

"Anyhow, if I were snorin' ye' shoulhae jist woke me." she said, merrily pouring orange juice onto the table 10 centimetres away from where her glass was as she did so.

"We _tried_" Courtney replied with narrowed eyes and grit teeth.

"Boy did they!" Izzy chimed in again "She yelled and shook you and Bridgette tried pouring water on your face and I played _Hey Ya _on the tuba but you just slept right through it. It was impressive, what's your secret?"

The concerned look returned as Shannon gently scooted down the bench away from Izzy. It was at that point she realised her error with the orange juice and she muttered an annoyed "arse" as she hastily righted her aim, attempting in vain to mop up the spilled beverage with her other sleeve.

Any further conversation was brought to a halt as someone attempted to kick open the door. The dull '**thump**' and the wheezy "Ouch!" confirmed to everyone that it was Harold outside.

And sure enough, ten seconds later, after the sounds of pained hopping ceased, the door was opened normally, and Harold stood proudly in the threshold, a bushy moustache drawn on his upper lip in what appeared to be permanent marker.

With that, any hold on the situation Chris once had devolved into nothing as the teens began laughing at Harold's new facial hair, and the chaos of breakfast resumed. People continued their conversations, Gwen joined Duncan in taking a nap in a bowl, Heather started going over the alliance rules to Beth and Lindsay, Cody and Noah distinctly refused to look at each other while Adam sat in-between them slightly confused; Izzy went off on another wild tangent, waving her spoon about dramatically for emphasis as she did so, resulting in milk being flicked onto her teammates; and so on for everyone else.

There was a lull in overall conversation as Heather turned to taunt the Bass, gracefully sidestepping the retaliatory flinging of cold porridge sent her way by Courtney, which flew into Gwen's face just as she was looking up to see what the noise was about.

"Okay campers!" Chris announced all of a sudden, tired of the attention being on someone other than him "Your next challenge begins in ten minutes!"

He was interrupted from the next part of his statement by a melodic chorus of moans, protesting the fact there was another challenge when they just finished the last one. Chris ignored each and every complaint levelled, and simply yelled "Be prepared to bring it!" over the din as he walked out of the mess hall.

Still moaning, the campers begrudgingly got up to follow him, breakfast evidently over.

* * *

**The Beach, thirteen minutes later**

"When th' bloody fuck did thes' get here?"

The object Shannon was referring to was the large plexiglass cuboid that had been erected on the beach apparently overnight, inside which appeared to be a school gym court, complete with two sets of bleachers.

Ignored Shannon's question, Chris stood in front of the crowd and spread his arms dramatically

"Welcome," he proclaimed in a dramatic voice "To the Arena!

"It is here where your next challenge will take place. And maybe some more in the future, who knows?" He added the last part with a knowing look to the camera that served only to confuse the campers more.

"If you'll follow me inside, you'll find that your next challenge is something you're all quite familiar with"

Chris strolled into 'The Arena' with his arms folded behind his back, and the campers followed behind with markedly less enthusiasm as the line progressed, ending with Duncan, who was so out of it he missed the door twice, eventually staggering inside and collapsing on the bench closest to the door.

"If any of you wake me up" he said as he mustered the last of his energy to raise his head "It'll be the last thing you do"

"This is all your fault!" yelled Courtney at Harold, seeming unreasonably angry at the idea of one of her team members being asleep "You and your snoring face!" sick burn

"It's called a medical condition" Harold replied calmly. "Gosh!" that bit wasn't so calm.

"Well then what's your excuse?" Courtney asked, fire undiminished, as she rounded on Shannon

"Uh, naebody ever told me aboot it?" she said in a confused voice, shrugging as she did so.

Before the Bass could devolve further into their favourite pastime of blamethrowing, they were cut off by the sound of a whistle being blown. It was Chef, dressed like a referee, his Chef hat missing which means the confession cam owes me a tenner.

He stalked angrily across the line of teenagers, until he came to Chris, who he stood beside, his face still a mask.

"Today's challenge," Chris said as he picked up a red rubber ball that had materialised next to him along with 9 more of its kin "is dodgeball

"Now, the first rule of dodgeball is-"

"Do not talk about dodgeball" Noah cut in, prompting sniggers from the teens.

"Is dodge" Chris replied, throwing the ball at Noah. It hit the bookworm square in the forehead, and he went down with a surprised cry of "Ack!"

"As I was saying, if you get hit by the ball," he threw the ball again, but this time the campers were ready, and his intended target, Courtney, ducked out of the way. However, standing behind her was the one person not paying attention, and so Shannon joined Noah on the floor

"-you're out" Chris finished

"Hey, you can't do that" called Courtney indignantly. From her feet, Shannon murmured "Think hae I feel"

Courtney ignored Shannon, and instead picked up the ball and threw it back at Chris. He caught it comfortably, and kept going with his explanation.

"If you catch the ball, the thrower gets sent out and the catcher gets to bring another team member out on the court."

"Throwing balls" said Noah as he picked himself up off the floor "Gee another mentally challenging test"

"I know, right?" agreed Lindsay. Before Noah could make any more snide remarks, Lindsay was whacked in the head by the dodgeball, which bounced off of her and landed on Noah.

"Less interruptions from the stands please!" said Chris as he picked up another ball. Noah rubbed his head angrily and glared, but said nothing.

"Anyway, Geoff!" he called, and the blonde boy looked up as Chis threw a ball into his waiting arms "Try to hit me"

Chris picked up another ball, and held it in front of him

"If you're holding a ball, you can use it to deflect a ball, but" and with that he dropped the ball for emphasis "If it knocks the ball out of your hands, you're out"

"Wait," asked Lindsay, still confused, and still rubbing her head from the ball impact "So what do I do when the ball comes at me again?"

"You dodge" and as if on cue, Geoff launched the ball at Chris, who deflected it cleanly into Lindsay's head for the second time, dropping her to the ground.

* * *

**Confession Cam – I was always picked last for dodgeball. I was home-schooled and an only child, but dad still chose the dog over me.**

Lindsay: There's a noticeable bruise forming on her forehead, which she rubs tentatively "I still don't get it"

Adam: "At this point they've said 'ball' so much it doesn't sound like a word. Ball. Ball. Ball." He stops talking normally, and starts murmuring nonsense words with a faint tun to it "Ball boo ba ba dee-da da do-wop" the rest trails offs into mumbling

* * *

"You have one minute until game time. Gophers, you'll have to sit one person out each round" Chris explained

"Wait, said Cody, raising his hand as though this was a classroom "Don't we have a two-person advantage"

"Fine, you'll sit two people out." at this, Cody received glares from his team, most of them from Heather. He paid no mind and continued his line of questioning.

"Oh, so the games are ten on ten?"

"No, five on five" Chris explained like it was obvious

"Then isn't sitting extra people out a moot point?" Cody asked. Chris opened his mouth to answer smugly, only to realise Cody was completely right. Frowning, Chris picked up a ball and lobbed it at him. He became the fourth separate headshot victim before the games even began, tumbling over backwards to land at the feet of Gwen.

Seizing his opportunity, Cody shot her a grin and a wink, and asked "Come here often?"

Gwen, evidently still annoyed about the prior night's misadventures, scowled at him, and walked over him, bringing her foot down hard on his chest, prompting pained gasps from the tech geek.

"Congratulations" drawled Noah, who had been watching the encounter with an amused smirk on his face "She finally stepped on you, you can die happy"

"Shut up, Noah" came the indignant reply from the ground

* * *

After brief team discussions to decide starting line-ups, the teams were assembled. Playing for the Gophers were Adam, Cody, Leshawna Owen, and Heather, and playing for the Bass were DJ, Courtney, Izzy, Harold and Tyler.

The two teams sized each other up, expressions ranging from malicious grins to confident smiles to Adam's look of sheer terror.

"Bring it on, fishies!" called Heather "Otherwise winning three in a row won't be as satisfying!"

"Oh, it is on!" Tyler yelled back "You're going down! We are gonna bring the dinner to the table, and then we're gonna eat it" nailed it big guy.

"Both teams ready?" Chris asked. The teams responded by dropping low, readying themselves to sprint for the balls

"Best of five games wins! Let's dodge some balls!" and with that, the awake teammates in the bleachers began cheering, with the exception of Noah, who had found a third book to read, and Chef blew the whistle.

The instant the first sounds of the whistle reached the campers, Izzy was off like a rocket, dashing forwards to grab as many balls as she could hold, tossing all but one backwards to her team as she lined up her first shot.

Cackling maniacally, she lifted her leg up perpendicular to the ground, bent her back farther backwards than it should go, and, using the momentum from swinging every possible limb she could, _launched_ her ball like a comet towards the Gopher lines.

It sailed forwards, whistling as it did so, seeming almost to home in on Adam, who could only stare wide-eyed in terror as the ball slammed into his face with the force of a train, sending him pinballing around the room, bouncing off of the walls, floor, ceiling and Owen's stomach; before he eventually bounced off the floor for a final time and flew out the back door of The Arena, landing head first in a pile of sand

"Commander Blake I don't want to be on the Island anymore" he burbled before he slumped, out cold.

And so, the games began.

Although Izzy had scooped up most of the balls, there were a lot around, so the remaining Gophers managed to get one each, plus the one Izzy had thrown. The initial burst of energy from Izzy faded as the nine teens stared each other down, until eventually Cody lobbed his ball towards Tyler. Tyler ducked, and scowled at the geek. The scowl shifted into a grin, and he begun spinning around to build momentum, and he tossed the ball...

Straight into the Bass bleachers, where it smacked Shannon in the face, dropping her to the ground again.

Before Tyler could wind up for a second throw, Owen charged at the Bass, managing to stop himself just short of the line, and he tossed the ball straight at Tyler, smacking him in the stomach and launching him against the far wall, hard enough to leave a dent.

After that, more misses followed, the closest anyone getting to a hit was Izzy second nuclear launch that shot straight between Heather's legs.

Harold attempted to unleash his true power, only for his true power to equate to a throw about an arm's span over the line, whereupon it was picked up by Leshawna and thrown back at the nerd, catching him in the back as he tried to run away and slamming him face first into the wall, landing right next to the Tyler shaped indent.

More fake-out throws and blatant misses followed, Owen somehow managed to matrix under a volley from DJ and Izzy, only to be caught as he stood up by Courtney. DJ deftly dodged a shot from Leshawna, and retaliated by missing her but hitting Heather. Cody continued to be an incredibly slippery target, somehow managing to not be there for just about every ball thrown at him, and he even managed to catch out Courtney.

Adam was fished out of his crater by an intern and unceremoniously flung back onto the court, only to be hit by another ball before he'd even landed, sending him straight to the bleachers. And so the game was left at two on two.

Izzy leapt towards the enemy team, screaming a war cry as she did so, and launching the ball towards Leshawna at the apex of her jump. That ball was dodged, but DJ's follow-up was not, and it slammed straight into her stomach, which left Cody as last man standing.

Cody stared at his opponents quivering in fear, as they advanced slowly on him, Izzy giving him a very worrying predatory grin.

"Easy out, guys!" called Courtney, happy to see things going her team's way for once. But those words were a mistake, for they awakening something in Cody. He looked down at the ball in his hands, and he got an idea. He spun it up into the air, muttered a few maths sounding words under his breath, took aim at a spot way above DJ's head, and threw.

DJ didn't even need to duck as the ball sailed over him, and he smiled victoriously, only for the ball to curve in mid-air and hit him in the ass. Izzy saw this and her grin turned into a frown. She adopted the same pose she had at the start of the game, began yelling, the manic grin swiftly returning to her face

"You cannot hope to defeat me! It's useless! Useless useless useless useless!" She yelled as she dashed forwards at breakneck pace, darting from side to side to throw off any counter throws. She launced the ball at Cody, and he took the only recourse left availble to him: he hit the deck, diving to the floor as the ball flew over his head, the airstream rippling the hair on the back of his head. The ball kept going, bouncing off of the back wall and sailing over Cody again, landing just in front of the linebetween the sides. Cody slowly got up awhen he heard the ball 'thunk' on the ground. He looked for any ball remaining on the Bass side of the field, and found none.

Now it was Cody's turn to grin maliciously, as he rubbed the red rubber ball on his shirt until it crackled and sparked with blue static.

He tossed the ball, Izzy managed to deftly cartwheel out of the way, only for the ball to make an even sharper turn than the spinner, and lance straight into Izzy's side.

Round one, Gophers.

* * *

While the Gophers cheered their victory and its unlikely victor, the Bass were in the midst of another team meeting.

"We can do this, guys!" said Harold, trying to psyche everyone up "We just have to believe!"

Geoff and Bridgette seemed fairly happy with this speech, nodding their heads and smiling, and that was about where the positive reception ended.

"Oh I believe alright." said Courtney, as irritable as ever "I believe you suck!" she yelled, poking Harold in the chest for emphasis

"Yeah" Tyler agreed, oblivious to his own failings "You throw like a girl"

"Ye're one tae talk" Groaned Shannon, finally picking herself up off the floor "Ye throw like a drunk after a bad eye surgery"

"It was a warm-up game!" Tyler protested "I can dominate this game, just give all the balls to me!"

A stellar plan, to be sure, and after hearing Chef's whistle and sighing deeply, Courtney relented.

"Fine! Just try to aim for the other side, okay?"

Tyler smiled, and got up to take his place on the court, followed by Geoff, Bridgette, Ezekiel and Shannon.

Halfway to the court, Ezekiel tugged on Shannon's sleeve

"Doon't you think this game looks a little dangeroos, eh?"

Shannon waved away his comment

"Ah, i''ll be fine"

"Bo'ot, didn't you see what happened to that small one?" he gestured to the Gopher bleachers, specifically Adam, who was still laid flat out on the bench, groaning in pain occasionally.

"Dinnae worry abou' i' Wurzel." She threw a comforting arm around his shoulder; unfortunately, she threw it too hard, making the boy wince "Think abou' i' like thes': if Sportacus's plan works out, then we win and ye' dinnae haftae dae anything. If it disnae, then I jist so happen tae be pretty good at thes' game, if I do say so meself."

"Ookay" Ezekiel replied nervously, and the two stepped on up to the court, to meet their opponents.

* * *

**Meanwhile, at the Gopher Bleachers**

"Alright Noah, you're up" said Heather, putting on her best 'do as I say or suffer my wrath' voice

"You know, you guys did such an awesome job on the last game, that I don't wanna mess up your mojo."

Heather looked ready to argue the point, but Chef's whistle cut her off, and she simply said "Fine"

Beth held up her hand, eager to be pelted by rubber balls or something, and Heather confirmed her spot on the line-up with a nod.

She was followed by Lindsay, still with no idea how the game worked and still nursing a nasty head bruise, but still eager to try; Owen, as eager to do just about anything as ever; and Trent and Katie rounded up the line-up, the latter looking a mite uncomfortable up in the spotlight.

* * *

**Round 2**

Round two of course began with Tyler, armed with every ball he could hold, which was a lot, adopting his prior strategy of spinning, which while it may be a good trick, does not serve you well in the aiming department.

As evidenced when his shots hit, in order, Chef in the stomach, a near miss on Chris's head, much to the host's chagrin; Noah's book, which was slammed into its reader's head; immobile seagull, who happened to be walking past the back door of the Arena; one flew into the Bass bleachers, barely ducked by Courtney, another flew into the Gopher bleachers, scattering the team save for Noah, who was still peeling his book off of his face and got hit again; and the final ball sailed true towards the Gophers who were actually playing, and hit Lindsay in the face for the third time that day.

At first Tyler looked at his handiwork proudly, then he realised exactly who it was he hit, and his face fell.

"No!" he yelled as she dashed over to Lindsay to check on her. From the stands, Courtney just seemed happy that he'd hit something that resembled an intended target.

Lindsay was pretty damn out of it when Tyler got there, mumbling to herself about shoes as her eyes slowly glazed over. Tyler, meanwhile, couldn't help but wince at the sight of Lindsay's once beautiful face, now covered in nasty looking bruises, and swelling on her left eye and her mouth.

Tyler hoisted Lindsay up off the ground, and once he'd assured her that her face was fine and _definitely_ not covered in bruises, he offered her a walk, completely ignoring the dodgeball that impacted on his cheek halfway through his sentence. Lindsay accepted, and the two walked out of The Arena happily, oblivious to Heather's attempts to vaporise the pair with sheer force of hatred.

Down to 4-4, game 2 once again slowed, as several easily dodged balls were thrown to test the waters. Trent almost got hit out once by Geoff, barely managing to duck in time. He attempted to respond in kind, but his throwing technique was all kinds of off, dragging his fingers down the ball as he attempted to release it, leaving the ball spinning uselessly in mid-air a bit in front of his face. Taking her opportunity, Shannon grinned and launched her ball as though she was bowling in cricket, her ball flying into Trent's hoverer, returning it to sender and making the score 3-4.

"See Wurzel?" She called back to Ezekiel, who had his ball held tight in front of his chest, ready to block at any given moment "I told ye' i''d be fine"

She turned back to her opponents, her arms spread wide as if beckoning them to try and hit her.

"Ye' call thes dodgeball? Mah nephew throws better then ye' an' he hasnae e'en bin born yet!"

Not willing to stand for this, a swift response came from the Gophers, in the form of Beth lobbing a ball at Shannon's head. She ducked, not even blinking (winking?) at the throw, as she looked back to Ezekiel, who was trying to make himself as small as possible

"See Wurzel? I told ye' i''d be fine. Numpties couldnae hit a tyre fire wi' a heat-seekin' missile"

Before Ezekiel could interpret that sentence and formulate a response, an indignant shout cut across the field

"Great Gatsby that is it!" yelled Owen, apparently having reached his limit. He grabbed a ball, windmilled it in his arm a few times, and hurled it at Shannon, who had just enough time to hear the whistling and jump over it. She landed slightly unsteady, and when she was done wobbling, she turned to her opponent, a grin plastered on her face

"Now tha's more like it!" she called, grabbing a ball of her own and lobbing it back towards Owen. He too dodged. "C'moan, Pickles, gimme a challenge!"

The two grabbed another ball each and hurled them at each other with all the force they could muster. Of course, being so focussed on throwing, neither payed any attention to the dodging aspect of dodgeball, and both balls flew straight anfd true into the face of the other. Owen staggered back a few paces, looking barely worse for the wear. Shannon, on the other hand, lacked Owen's momentum dampening blubber, and as a result was catapulted across the court and into the back wall to leave a Shannon-shaped imprint next to the ones shaped like Tyler and Harold.

Both teens were declared out, and Shannon slumped against the wall, her one visible eye glazing over. She brought a shaky hand up in front of her face, and waved it about idly.

"Fuck me, I shouldnae be seein' three a' those" she slurred out, before her eye fluttered closed and she fell unconscious.

With both teams down a solid player, the rest of the players felt it was probably time for them to start playing the game again

Well, three of the five remaining players did at least. Geoff, Bridgette and Beth all got back into the spirit of throwing red rubber balls at each other, while Katie did her best to hover around where she thought the balls would be flying the least, and Ezekiel had retreated to a corner of the court and was curled up into a ball muttering to himself

Despite being surprisingly adept at dodging Bridgette and Geoff's volleys, her small stature lending itself well to avoidance much like Cody before her, Beth felt very much backed into a corner. She couldn't dodge forever, and she was effectively the only member of her team left, what with Katie's inability to do anything except not get hit. Facing down her two more active opponents of Bridgette and Geoff, and making a mental note of where Ezekiel was curled up in a ball, the farm girl's mind began to race for some plan to try and swing this into a win.

Any trains of thought were prevented from even leaving the station by a co-ordinated volley from the other side of the court, one which Beth barely managed to dodge. She threw a ball back in a vague attempt at defiance, and it was there that everything went wrong for her.

The throw itself was token, with barely enough strength to make it over the halfway line between the courts. But Geoff had seen his opportunity, and as the ball sailed a metre to his right, he dove like a bodyguard taking a bullet for his charge, securing the ball in his arms as he landed. He rolled onto his back, holding the ball up in triumph, as the Bass erupted in cheers. Beth was out, and game 2 was as good as theirs. And as the team quickly reached their decision and Izzy walked back out onto the court, the result was almost assured.

The sounds of the Bass cheering finally snapped Katie out of her semi-conscious daze, and she finally saw the Bass team ready to end it all. She gulped, her mind racing as she tried like Beth before her to see some way out of this mess.

Her mind continued racing, until eventually her panic receded somewhat and her thoughts returned back to where they'd been drifting for the past week. Sadie wasn't here. She tried and she tried, but she just couldn't move past that. Lindsay and Beth helped, but it wasn't the same. Without Sadie, the world just felt... emptier, like there was some integral part missing, but no-one except her noticed.

But as Katie looked towards the grinning faces of the Killer Bass, something changed in her thought processes, as though a gear in her mind suddenly began turning the other way, and just like that, everything came into place with a satisfying '**thunk**'.

Sadie wasn't here. And she shouldn't be sad about that. She should be _**angry**_. She looked at the Bass again, at their stupid grinning faces and their stupid dodgeballs, and her expression of worry turned to a frown of anger. Sadie wasn't here.

And it was **their** fault.

None of the Bass noticed the shift in Katie's demeanour, instead revelling in their imminent victory. With her ever-present grin on her face, Izzy launched another murderball towards Katie, the ball sailing true and soaring towards her head.

Without flinching, or even staggering under the impact for that matter, Katie caught the speeding rubber mass of death in one hand.

In an instant, The Arena fell into silence, with expressions ranging from confusion from the stands, indifference from Noah, who was still reading his book; fear in the eyes of the Bass on the court, and sheer opportunistic glee in the eyes of Chris.

Before the Gophers could decide who'd get thrown out onto the court to join Katie, the girl in question let out a scream of incomprehensible fury, and, mustering every ounce of anger she'd ever felt in her life, launched the dodgeball with enough force to put Izzy's murderballs to shame.

It smacked Geoff in the face, ricocheting to Bridgette, who was hit in the shoulder, and ricocheted a third time to Izzy, who got caught in the gut. All three dropped to the ground, leaving Ezekiel alone. He quickly dropped the ball he'd been clutching as though it was a childhood toy, and held his hands up in the air as high as they could go

"I surrender!" he yelled; eyes wide with panic.

Chef blew his whistle, and so game 2 ended just as its forebear, with a Gopher victory snatched from the jaws of defeat.

With the game over, Katie visibly relaxed, breathing heavily. She walked over to the Gopher bench, oblivious to her teammates giving her a wide berth, curled up like a cat on the end of a bench, and drifted off to sleep.

* * *

**Confession Cam – Where in the goddamn did that come from?**

Katie: She sighs contentedly to herself, a small smile on her face. "I needed that. To get it all out of my system. I think..." her expression drops for a split second, but she swiftly recovers "I think I'm ready to keep going. Just you wait, Sadie! We'll be back together before you know it, and I'll come back a winner!"

* * *

**The Gopher Bleachers**

The Gophers were still in a shocked silence, the only sound being the occasional turning of a page by Noah. After a bout a minute, he picked up on the silence

"Did we win?" he asked, not sounding at all as though he actually cared about the answer. The question snapped the Gophers out of their daze.

"Yeah, we did," replied Heather, the permanent irritation already back in her voice

"Oh. Yaaaaay, go team" he said with about as little enthusiasm as is humanly possible.

"Would it kill you to try at this?" asked Heather

"Hey, if you want to break this little winning streak you've got going on, go ahead, throw me out there." Noah replied with a smirk on his face, the smirk deepening when Heather failed to come up with a reply "So, for the sake of the team, I'll just keep sitting out"

"How noble of you" said Gwen, rolling her eyes

"Indeed" said Noah, already engrossed once again in his book and not paying any attention.

"Jerk"  
"Loser" said Gwen and Heather simultaneously. Then they came to a realisation about what just happened and their eyes widened

* * *

**Confession Cam – I'm still far too befuddled to come up with something witty**

Gwen: "Did we just-"

Heather: "Agree with each other?"

Gwen and Heather, simultaneously: "No way!"

* * *

**The Bass Bleachers**

"What was that?! Surrender?!" yelled Courtney, who was in the process of berating Ezekiel "You could have at least tried!"

"Dude, chill" cut in Geoff, now nursing a nasty looking black eye "If I'd known she was gonna do that, I'd have surrendered too."

"Ugh!" cried Courtney, pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration "You're right." She said a few seconds later, a degree calmer "I'm sorry Ezekiel. It's just we had them, and then they pull that nonsense out of nowhere and now we're about to lose for the third time in a row!"

Courtney continued to get progressively more and more worked up as she continued her sentence, and the rest of the Killer Bass began to tune her out as she reverted back into irate muttering.

"So," said Geoff, turning to the rest of the team "Now what do we do?"

The rest of his team all looked blankly at him, with the exception of Courtney, who was kicking a dodgeball repeatedly in frustration.

"C'mon guys, we gotta think of something! Duncan's still out, Tyler's out with that chick from the other team, and Courtney's-" he was cut out by an irritated cry from the girl in question,who gave the dodgeball an extra hard kick into a wall, upon which it bounced back and hit her in the stomach

"Courtney's busy." Geoff finished, subconsciously inching away from her. He turned to Bridgette, who as the only team member with first aid expereince, was the one tasked with keeping an eye on Shannon

"How's she doing, Bridge?" Geoff asked, hoping for a spot of good news.

"No good" came the sighed reply as Bridgette handed an ice pack she'd procured from somewhere to Shannon "I'm pretty sure she's concussed"

"No a'm no', a'm fine!" Shannon slurred as she tried to stand up. The moment she reached her full height, her legs almost immediately gave out beneath her, and she toppled backwards into Bridgette's arms, who knew this would happen

"Okay maybe a'm no' so good" she mumbled to herself as Bridgette set her down on the bench behind Duncan, leaving the Bass with only one bleacher left for sitting on.

"Dang" said Geoff "Now what?"

Still no ideas came forth from the Bass, just more blank stares, and a few looks of deep thought.

"Oooh!" cried Izzy, finger raised to the sky as she had her eureka moment "Idea! Okay, so, can anyone speak Mandarin?"

Everyone sighed as they realised that the plan was both crazy and infeasible, until Ezekiel piped up

"I, uh, I can speak Mandarin" he said tentatively. Everyone looked at him in surprise, except of course Izzy, who took it all in stride

"Great!" she exclaimed, rubbing her hands together in glee "That's step one. Now, next we need three kilograms of flour, ideally self-raising but plain will do, and then we need to gain access to the nearest-"

She was cut off by another annoyed yell from Courtney, who had finally finished taking out her frustrations on the poor defenceless dodgeball which sat slowly leaking air in the corner. Courtney wheeled around to face her team, her eyes ablaze with pure determination. She was not losing again.

"I'll tell you exactly what we're going to do." She said, her voice cutting across Izzy's ramblings and immediately catching the attention of her team. "We're going to stop messing around, we're going to get our heads on straight, and we're going to beat the other team before they can come up with any more crap to pull out of nowhere to beat us with!"

The rest of the Bass looked at her with rapt attention, with the exception being Izzy, who was still rattling on, but no-one was paying any attention to her.

"Okay, step one: Harold, go wake up Duncan." Everyone turned to look at Harold, who was now wide-eyed in a mixture of shock and fear

"What?!" exclaimed Harold, clearly not happy at his part in this plan "Why me?"

"Because, of the two people here responsible for Duncan's condition, you are the only one who's conscious."

"Gosh, I told you, it's a medical condition!" Harold cried in indignation

"And I told you to go wake up Duncan, so I guess both of us are pretty miserable right now!" Courtney yelled right back, refusing to take any more of Harold's crap "Look, someone is going to wake up Duncan, and I don't see any other member of the team we can afford to lose!"

"No way, I'm not doing it!"

Their argument continued in that same, circular fashion for a good minute, gradually getting louder and louder. So loud in fact, that it roused Shannon from her concussed stupor.

"Shut th' fuck up, a'm tryin' tae sleep here!" she moaned as she weakly threw a dodgeball at Courtney. Her aim was well off, and the ball sailed forwards scant inches, instead landing firmly on Duncan's face. He frowned in his slumber, only for another yell from Harold to wake him entirely. His frown deepened into a scowl, and he marched over to Courtney, tapping her on the shoulder while she was mid-rant. She wheeled around in irritation

"Not now Duncan, I'm trying to get Harold to go wake up Duncan!" she snapped, instantly spinning back around to continue berating Harold. Harold however had stopped arguing, instead eyeing up the new arrival behind Courtney in apprehension. With her brain still running hot from the argument, it took Courtney a few seconds longer than it should have to put two and two together, and when she did her eyes widened with dawning realisation.

Courtney wheeled around to face Duncan, who looked at her with a raised eyebrow, arms folded over his chest

"So," he said, an aura of menace filtering through his calm tone "Care to explain why you needed to get so loud?"

"Because," Courtney replied, actually mustering enough courage to look Duncan square in the eyes as she did so. Presumably as a result of leftover anger, but still "We're down 2-0, and loathe as I am to admit it, we need your help"

"And why should I help you, darling?"

That comment got Courtney's blood boiling again, and the spark of anger returned to her eyes as they narrowed at Duncan.

"Because, I can personally guarantee you that if we lose this game, you'll be the one going home, _darling"_

The two stared intently at each other for a moment, neither willing to back down, until eventually Duncan sighed.

"Fine," he said, averting his gaze from Courtney's smug expression of victory "I'll play. On one condition. You have to do what I say, when I say it"

That caveat took some of the wind out of Courtney's sails, but nevertheless she agreed to Duncan's request with a nod. Duncan grinned.

"Alright, so I got this strategy on my first trip to juvie..." he began as he beckoned the team into a huddle. The Bass piled in with the exception of Shannon, still incapacitated, and Izzy, still rambling on about whatever.

"Of course, then we have to worry about the leopard, but hopefully he filled up on popcorn and is too tired to chase us, and-" she abruptly broke off when she finally noticed the lack of people listening to her. "Hey where'd everybody go?"

"Fucked off tae listen to some shite Zippy learnt in the slammer" Shannon mumbled as a response "I think they stopped listenin' aboot th' bit wi' the trampoline."

"Awww, they missed the best part. Oh well, I'll keep it for plan B"

"Aye, ye' do tha' Dizzee"

* * *

**And we're back baby, with the shortest chapter to date. The two-part format is probably gonna end up the standard, it keeps the individual chapters from becoming massive 12k word behemoths, and allows me a bit more room to wriggle with length and such.**

**This one was definitely more focussed on the action on the court, Katie's big rage was something I'd had planned since near the beginning of this, next chapter will deal more with the action in the stands, specifially stuff with Noah, and some other stuff with Trent and Gwen.**

**I'm coming up in this fic's 1 year anniversary, which feels weird, and I certainly don't feel like I've written a year's worth of content. I'd try and get the next chapter ready for the anniversary, but I think we all know that's not going to happen.**

**So yeah, that's all, leave reviews, favourtes et al. if you feel so inclined, and I'll see you probably in the new year. Hoefully it's less shit than this one.**


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